LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


V.  V.'s   Eyes 


Si*=wrJB  Pie 


THIS  MISS   HETH?    (p.  44) 


V.V.'s  Eyes 

BY 

HENRY  SYDNOR  HARRISON 

AUTHOR  OF  "QUEED" 


WITH    ILLUSTRATIONS 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

ftitocrs'i&c  press 
1913 


rOF.NIA 


COPYRIGHT,    1913,    BY   HENRY   SYDNOR  HARRISON 
ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 

Published  May  1913 


To  my  first,  second,  and  third  reader 

NORVELL 
Who  raises  books  by  hand 


CONTENTS 
I 

Two  Houses,  with  a  great  Gulf  between;  of  V.  Vivian,  M.D.,  and 
what  he  thought  of  John  the  Baptist i 

ii 

Two  Persons  of  More  Importance,  and  why  they  went  to  the  Beach  in 
October;  Miss  Carlisle  Heth,  and  how  she  met  an  Unwelcome 
Swain  at  Sea;  how  this  Swain  could  swim  enough  for  one  .  .  12 

in 

How  Carlisle  screamed  when  the  Boat  upset,  or  else  did  n't,  as  the 
Case  might  be;  also  of  Mrs.  Heth,  who  went  down  Six  Floors  to 
nail  Falsehoods,  etc 26 

IV 

Mr.  Hugo  Canning,  of  the  well-known  Pursuing-Sex ;  how  the  Great 
Young  Man  pursued  Miss  Heth  to  a  Summer-House,  and  what 
stopped  his  Thundering  Feet 36 

V 

Dialogue  between  V.  Vivian,  of  the  Slums,  and  Mr.  Heth's  Daughter 
(or  his  Niece);  and  what  the  lovely  Hun  saw  in  the  Mr.  Vivian's 
eyes,  just  before  he  asked  God  to  pity  her 48 

VI 

Of  Carlisle's  Bewilderment  over  all  the  Horrid  Talk;  of  how  it  was  n't 
her  Fault  that  Gossip  was  so  Unreliable;  of  the  Greatest  Game  in 
the  World;  also,  of  Mr.  Heth,  who  did  n't  look  like  a  Shameless 
Homicide 61 

VII 

How  the  Great  Parti,  pursued  or  pursuing  to  Cousin  Willie  Kerr's 
Apartment,  begins  thundering  again 73 

vii 


Contents 


VIII 

Supper  with  the  Cooneys:  Poor  Relations,  but  you  must  be  Nice  to 
them;  of  Hen  Cooney's  friend  V.  V.,  as  she  irritatingly  calls  him; 
also  relating  how  Cally  is  asked  for  her  Forgiveness,  and  can't 
seem  to  think  what  to  say 87 

IX 

Concerning  an  Abandoned  Hotel,  and  who  lived  there;  also  of  an 
Abandoned  Youth,  who  lived  somewhere  else,  Far  Away;  how  a 
Slum  Doctor  dressed  for  a  Function,  such  as  involved  Studs;  and 
how  Kern  Garland  wishted  she  was  a  Lady 105 

x 

A  Beautiful  New  Year's  Party,  and  who  spoiled  it,  and  how;  how 
Something  is  done,  after  all,  for  she  tells  the  Man  plainly  that  he 
must  n't  speak  to  her  any  more 120 

XI 

In  which  Mr.  Canning  must  go  South  for  his  Health,  and  Cally  lies 
awake  to  think 134 

XII 

How  V.  Vivian  still  felt  the  Same  about  the  Huns,  No  Matter  what 
Sam  Thought;  also  how  Kern  Garland  lost  Something  at  the 
Works,  and  what  made  Mr.  V.  V.  look  at  her  That  Way  .  .  .  146 

XIII 

How  Life  was  Gray  and  Everything  was  Horrid;  how  Carlisle  went 
to  Little  Africa  with  Hen;  how  the  Man  spoke  to  her  again,  just 
the  same,  and  what  happened  then;  further,  reporting  a  Confiden 
tial  Talk  with  a  Best  Girl-Friend 159 

XIV 

In  which  Cally  tells  a  Certain  Person  that  she  is  n't  Happy  —  Very  180 

xv 

In  which  she  goes  to  New  York  and  is  very  Happy  indeed     .    .     .  190 

XVI 

Of  Happiness  continuing,  and  what  all  the  World  loves;  revealing, 
however,  that  not  Every  Girl  can  do  what  the  French  People  once  did  201 

viii 


Contents 


XVII 

Catty  crosses  the  Great  Gulf;  and  it  is  n't  quite  Clear  how  she  will  ever 
cross  back  again  216 

XVIII 

Night-Thoughts  on  the  Hardness  of  Religious  Fellows,  compelling 
you  to  be  Hard,  too;  Happier  Things  again,  such  as  Hugo, 
Europe,  Trousseaux,  etc.;  concluding  with  a  Letter  from  Texas 
and  a  Little  Vulgarian  in  a  Red  Hat 235 

XIX 

How  it  is  One  Thing  to  run  away  from  yourself,  and  another  to 
escape;  how  Catty  orders  the  Best  Cocktails,  and  gazes  at  her 
Mother  asleep;  also  of  Jefferson  4127,  and  why  Mamma  left  the 
Table  in  a  hurry  at  the  Cafe  des  Ambassadeurs 249 

xx 

In  which  Jack  Dalhousie  wears  a  New  Dignity,  and  the  Lame 
Stranger  comes  to  the  House  of  Heth 266 

XXI 

That  Day  at  the  Beach,  as  we  sit  and  look  back  at  it;  how  Hugo 
journeys  to  shield  his  Love  from  Harm,  and  Small  Beginnings 
can  end  with  Uproars  and  a  Proverb 278 

XXII 

One  Summer  in  the  Old  Hotel;  of  the  World's  wagging  on,  Kern 
Garland,  and  Prince  Serge  Suits;  of  how  Kern  leaves  the  Works 
for  Good  and  has  a  Dream  about  Mr.  V.  V.'s  Beautiful  Lady;  of 
how  Mr.  V.  V.  came  to  sit  in  the  Still  Watches  and  think  again  of 
John  the  Baptist 296 

XXIII 

One  Summer  in  Europe,  which  she  never  speaks  of  now;  Home  again, 
with  what  a  Difference;  Novel  Questionings,  as  to  what  is  a  Friend, 
etc 320 

XXIV 

How  the  Best  People  came  to  the  Old  Hotel  again;  how  Catty  is 
Ornamental,  maybe,  but  hardly  a  Useful  Person;  how  she 
encounters  Three  Surprises  from  Three  Various  Men,  all  dis 
agreeable  but  the  Last 334 

ix 


Contents 


XXV 

In  which  the  Name  of  Beth  is  lifted  beyond  the  Reach  of  Hateful 
Malice,  and  Mamma  wishes  that  she  had  the  Ten  Thousand  back 


XXVI 

Concerning  Women  who  won't  remember  their  Place,  and  a  Speech  to 
Two  Hundred  of  them,  by  Mr.  V.  V.,  no  less;  also  revealing  why 
Hen  Cooney  never  found  V.  V.  in  the  Crowd  around  the  Platform  363 

XXVII 

Of  one  of  the  Triumphs  of  Catty's  Life,  and  the  Tete-a-tete  following, 
which  vaguely  depresses  her;  of  the  Little  Work-Girl  who  brought 
the  Note  that  Sunday,  oddly  remet  at  Gentlemen's  Furnishings  .  378 

XXVIII 

A  Little  Visit  to  the  Birthplace  of  the  Family;  how  Catty  thinks 
Socialism  and  almost  faints,  and  Hugo's  Afternoon  of  Romance 
ends  Short  in  the  Middle  .............  394 

XXIX 

One  Hour,  in  which  she  apologizes  twice  for  her  Self,  her  Life  and 
Works;  and  once  she  is  beautifully  forgiven,  and  once  she  never 
will  be,  this  Side  of  the  Last  Trump  .........  410 

XXX 

How  it  sounded  like  an  Epitaph,  but  still  she  would  not  cry;  how  she 
thinks  of  the  Beach  again,  and  hugs  a  Hateful  Word  to  her 
Bosom;  how  Hugo  starts  suddenly  on  a  sort  of  Wedding-Trip  .427 

XXXI 

Second  Cataclysm  in  the  House;  of  the  Dark  Cloud  obscuring  the  New 
Day,  and  the  Violets  that  had  faded  behind  a  Curtain,  etc.;  but 
chiefly  of  a  Little  Talk  with  Mamma,  which  produced  Moral 
Results,  after  all  ................  443 

XXXII 

Time's  Jests,  and  now  the  Perfect  Apology,  to  stand  a  Lifetime  in 
Brick  and  Stone;  concluding  with  a  Little  Scene,  which  she  will 
remember  while  she  lives  .............  459 


Contents 


XXXIII 

Her  Last  Day,  in  this  History;  how  she  wakes  with  a  Wonder  in  her 
Heart,  has  her  Banquet  laid  at  the  Board  of  the  Cooneys,  dreams 
back  over  the  Long  Strange  Year;  finally  how  she  learns  Something 
that  not  Everybody  Knows:  what  it  is  like  at  the  End  of  the  World  476 

xxxiv 

In  which  to  love  much  is  to  be  much  loved,  and  Kern's  Dearest  Dream 
(but  one}  comes  True 495 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

iifs  THIS  Miss  HETH?"  (page  44)         ....       Frontispiece 
"THERE  'S  SOMETHING  WRONG,  SlR,  MR.  V.  V."        .      .      .  IlS 

"PLEASE  DON'T  TROUBLE,  HUGO" 260 

"PAPA — I  WANT  TO  INTRODUCE  A  GOOD  FRIEND  OF  MINE  — 
DR.  VIVIAN  "      .      .      .      .      .      .     >      .     \     .      .  '    .  474 

From  drawings  by  Raymond  M.  Crosby 


V.  V.'s   Eyes 

i 

Two  Houses,  with  a  great  Gulf  between;  of  V.  Vivian,  M.D.,  and 
what  he  thought  of  John  the  Baptist. 

V  VIVIAN,  M.D.  by  the  paint  upon  his  window,  dwelt  in 
the  Dabney  House;  Mr.  Heth  —  pronounced  Heath  if 
*  you  value  his  wife's  good  opinion — dwelt  in  the  House 
of  his  cognomen.  Between  the  two  lay  a  scant  mile  of  city  streets. 
But  then  this  happened  to  be  the  particular  mile  which  tra 
versed,  while  of  course  it  could  not  span,  the  Great  Gulf  fixed. 
In  one  sense  (though  the  wrong  one)  the  Dabney  House  was  the 
more  impressive  of  the  pair  of  domiciles:  for  it  was  seven  stories 
tall  and  had  two  hundred  rooms;  while  the  House  of  Heth  was 
only  four  stories  and  basement,  and  had  but  fourteen  rooms, 
counting  in  the  trunk-room.  But  physical  size  is  size  only: 
whereby  hang  few  tales.  Over  and  in  the  Heth  House  there  pre 
vailed  the  most-  charming  air  of  ease  with  dignity,  of  taste  plus 
means,  that  you  could  well  imagine:  while  the  circumambient 
atmosphere  of  the  Dabney  House,  not  to  put  too  fine  a  point  on 
it,  was  the  abomination  of  desolation,  or  that  abomination's 
little  brother.  Before  the  one  stretched  a  brilliant  street  where 
imposing  residences  crowded  each  other  just  as  close  as  they 
could  crowd,  and  still  be  imposing,  and  residences.  Behind  the 
other  stretched  the  likeliest  the  city  could  show  in  the  way  of 
slums,  and,  farther  back,  just  over  the  brow  of  the  sinister  Hill, 
something  less  cheering  than  honest  slums.  One  glittered  upon 
the  future;  the  other  decayed  into  the  past.  And  it  would  cost 
you  —  to  clinch  the  comparison  with  the  true  and  only  —  two 
thousand  dollars  a  year,  say,  to  secure  Mr.  Heth's  house,  nego- 

i 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

tiating  with  his  executor  at  that;  while  in  the  great  pile  of  the 
eponymous  Dabney,  you  could  have  all  of  three  rooms  and 
(portable)  bath  for  twelve  dollars  a  month,  though  strictly  cash 
in  advance.  .  .  . 

Cartographers,  with  their  miserable  mathematics,  called  this  a 
statute  mile,  which,  as  we  say,  a  brisk  man  can  walk  in  the  smok 
ing  of  a  cigarette.  But  the  authors  of  the  Blue  Book,  grave  fel 
lows  who  have  better  struck  the  scales  from  their  eyes,  would 
have  computed  you  this  distance  at  N,  which  is  infinity:  and  so 
closed  up  the  book.  For  what  bridge  shall  cross  the  uncrossable, 
what  ferryman  ply  for  silver  pounds  on  the  Great  Gulf?  An 
image-breaking  age;  no  doubt;  but  there  are  limits,  in  decency. 
No  thread  of  destiny  or  clue  of  circumstance  shall  connect  two 
Houses  set  upon  the  poles  of  the  world.  .  .  . 

So  spoke  the  Blue  Book:  judging  somewhat  by  the  look  of  it, 
after  all,  pronouncing  not  without  a  touch  of  the  weary  wisdom 
which  comes  of  knowing  too  much.  But  is  it  not  written  how  the 
hussy  Appearance  wears  a  painted  face,  justly  open  to  interroga 
tion? —  how  there  stands  a  summit  from  which  a  man  shall  see 
yet  more  sharply  than  his  most  admired  authors,  above  referred 
to?  Hence,  look  down.  And  behold,  against  the  sunny  day  two 
clues  now  visible  upon  the  bosom  of  the  Gulf,  to  wit:  the  dark- 
eyed  lad  so  oddly  taking  hired-carriage  exercise  up  and  down 
Washington  Street,  between  eight-thirty  and  ten-thirty  A.M.  ;  and 
yon  half-column  of  winged  words  in  "The  People's  Forum"  col 
umn  of  this  morning's  "Post,"  under  the  caption  (supplied  by 
the  editor) :  "  Severe  Arraignment  of  Local  Factory  Conditions." 

The  Dabney  House  felt  the  pluckings  first.  They  were  No 
bodies  there;  and  by  that  token  they  were  early  risers. 

She  was  fluttered  to-day,  was  Mrs.  Garland,  by  the  nocturnal 
reappearance  of  her  errant  husband,  Mister,  as  simply  called: 
but  she  did  not  forget  the  iron  rule.  The  "Post"  was  under  the 
door  by  seven  o'clock.  Dr.  Vivian  perused  by  seven-fifteen.  He 
perused  with  a  peculiar  and  paternal  gusto :  for  doctoring  was  not 
his  meat  and  drink,  and  he  had  written  these  winged  words  him 
self.  But  of  the  vehicular  lad  he  heard  nothing  till  some  hours 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


later,  when  Labor  Commissioner  O'Neill,  skirting  the  old  park 
from  Centre  Street,  where  he  had  been  for  cigars,  dropped  in  on 
the  way  back  to  his  office. 

Even  here,  the  words  came  first.  O'Neill  had  a  "Post"  in  his 
hand. 

It  was  then  nearing  eleven  o'clock.  The  doctor  sat  at  a  tall 
old  "secretary"  between  his  windows,  swinging  round  with  ex 
pectancy  as  his  friend  entered.  There  were  still  people  of  a  sort, 
human  beings  in  a  manner  of  speaking,  in  the  waiting-room;  but 
he  let  them  wait  now,  that  being  what  the  room  was  for. 

"Well?  .  .  .  How  'd  it  strike  you?" 

The  Labor  Commissioner  mopped  his  brow  with  a  snowy 
handkerchief,  which  released  into  the  office  the  scent  of  cologne. 
He  was  a  stoutish  man,  and  the  morning,  for  autumn,  was  aston 
ishingly  warm. 

"Well,  it's  ill-timed,  V.  V.,"  said  he,  without  ill-humor.  "And 
—  kind  of  extreme.  I  told  you  the  other  day  how  I  felt  about  it." 

The  face  of  the  medico  fell. 

"I  thought  you  said  you  approved  of  a  good,  pertinent  letter, 
to  show  that  the  laity  were  backing  you  up!" 

"I  said  a  mild,  easy- tempered  letter  might  be  all  right.  But — " 

"Why,  Sam,  don't  you  think  that's  an  awfully  mild  letter? 
You  ought  to  see  what  I  edited  out  of  it." 

"Well,  you  left  in  enough  to  let  the  'Post'  in  for  a  damage 
suit,  all  right.  You,  too.  .  .  .  Only  you  won't  have  much  to  lodge 
a  judgment  against,  long 's  you  have  n't  got  a  billhead  printed 
and  charge  regular  fees  like  I  told  you." 

"I'm  perfectly  responsible  —  far  as  that  goes.  Don't  you 
worry." 

The  doctor's  look  showed  that  he  considered  O'Neill's  pleas 
antry  in  bad  taste,  to  say  the  least  of  it.  He  had  told  Sam  often 
enough,  one  would  think,  that  he  meant  before  long  to  put  in  a 
good  businesslike  system  of  fees,  small  fees  .  .  . 

The  Commissioner  was  continuing:  "Point  is,  V.  V.,  there's 
nothing  gained  getting  these  people's  backs  way  up.  They're 
sore  now.  A  little  tact,  a  little  bit  of  — " 

"Tact!" 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Sure  thing.  Look  here,  old  boy,  remember  it's  only  a  week 
since  my  report  was  in  the  papers,  practically  blacklisting  those 
four  plants,  and  I've  already  called  personally  on  every  one  of 
'em,  putting  it  right  up  to  'em.  You  heard  me  at  Heth's  and  the 
Pickle  people's,  yourself.  I  guess  I  put  it  up  about  as  strong  as 
could  be  done,  hey?  And  that 's  all  can  be  done  till  I  get  me  some 
more  law.  Put  it  right  square  ..." 

But  V.  Vivian,  gazing  steadily  over  the  chair-back,  had 
obviously  been  stoking  his  inner  fuel. 

"Ah!  Rousing  public  opinion's  no  use  at  all?  .  .  .  Why,  don't 
you  know  that  public  opinion  is  the  grandfather  of  your  little 
statute-book  laws?  Don't  you  — " 

"Yair.    Know.   See  you  say  that  in  your  letter." 

"Well,  it 's  a  great  truth!  .  .  .  How  tactful  will  you  feel  some 
day,  when  one  of  those  floors  at  the  Heth  Works  collapses  and 
kills  a  hundred  people?" 

Labor  Commissioner  O'Neill  seemed  un terrified  by  the  grisly 
picture.  He  was  strolling  about  the  very  large,  bare,  and  strange- 
looking  medical  office,  flicking  cigar-ash  where  he  would :  a  good- 
natured-looking  Commissioner  of  thirty,  wearing  a  glossy  brown 
suit  and  strong  yellow  gloves.  And  his  present  pacific  air  was 
undoubtedly  to  his  credit;  certainly  he  had  been  annoyed  when 
his  eye  first  fell  on  the  "Severe  Arraignment,"  over  his  morning 
rasher.  .  .  . 

"And  that  isn't  the  worst  of  it,"  shot  the  doctor  again,  flinging 
out  an  arm.  "It's  only  a  detail,  I  say,  this  factory  end  of  it; 
only  a  symptom,  don't  you  see?  What  we're  dealing  with  is  the 
most  dangerous  element  in  the  life  of  this  city!  Tact!  .  .  .  When 
fire  could  n't  sweep  through  that  new  house  of  yours  faster  than 
the  corrupting  ideals  of  these  people  '11  lick  through  this  com 
munity!" 

"Whe-ew!"  said  Sam  O'Neill,  this  ground  being  not  unfa 
miliar.  .  .  .  "Got  to  take  'em  along  slowly,  Doctor,  all  the  same. 
Rome  was  n't  built  in  a  day." 

"But  mark  my  words,  the  vandals  kicked  it  down  in  about 
fifteen  minutes." 

O'Neill  felt  vaguely  worsted  by  this  riposte.  He  was  the  older 

4 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

man,  the  practical  man,  with  a  proven  ability  to  make  money  out 
of  real  estate;  but  old  V.  V.,  though  talking  like  an  anarchist 
of  late,  was  admitted  to  have  a  verbal  dexterity  at  debate.  Argu 
ment  was  forced  upon  Sam,  as  it  were.  He  demanded  authority 
for  calling  these  people  corrupting ;  desired  to  know  if  V.  V.  knew 
any  of  'em  personally.  And  presently  he  was  reading  aloud  from 
the  letter  in  the  "Post,"  reading  retributively;  one  swingeing 
phrase  after  another. 

"And  here  —  here!  Listen  to  this,  will  you?  —  'Why  should 
we  stand  by  and  permit  these  shameless  egoists  of  industry  to 
bleed  the  strength  from  the  community's  sinew  and  grow  rich  by 
homicide  at  the  cost  of  the  race?'  .  .  ." 

Severe,  indeed,  the  Arraignment  seemed  when  read  aloud  to 
you  in  that  tone.  Gusto  ebbed  a  little,  mayhap.  But  it  was  clear 
that  the  medical  author  did  not  propose  to  retract;  quite  the 
contrary,  in  short. 

"Permit!  Ought  to  have  asked  why  we  applaud  them,  court 
.  them,  envy  them  — " 

"'Shameless  homicides'!  —  and  he  calls  it  mild!  Now,  here, 
honor  bright — " 

"It's  what  they  are  —  and  more!  You  ask  me  if  I  know  these 
people  personally?  I  reply  that  in  the  truest  sense  I  do  know  'em, 
very  well,  for  I've  made  a  study  of  the  type,  d'  you  see?  .  .  ." 

Then  the  office  door  from  the  hall  opened  about  a  foot,  a  fat 
head  in  a  gaunt  bonnet  protruded  through  the  crevice,  having 
rather  a  decapitated  look,  and  a  deep  inflectionless  voice  said: 

"Excuse  me  introodin',  Doctor,  I'm  sure,  but  your  sick  here 
raskin'  me  kin  they  see  you  soon." 

"In  five  minutes  precisely  ..." 

Morning  sunshine  streamed  through  the  unwashen  windows. 
V.  Vivian  had  risen  in  the  ardor  of  his  argument.  Quite  a  differ 
ent-looking  man  from  the  Commissioner  he  was  observed  to  be, 
tall  where  the  Commissioner  was  thick,  eager  where  the  Com 
missioner  was  easy-going.  Rather  a  long  face  he  had,  sensitive 
about  the  mouth,  lucid  about  the  gaze,  and  hair  of  a  tan  shade 
which  waved  a  little,  no  matter  how  crisply  cut.  The  faded  gray 
suit  he  wore  contrasted  unfavorably  with  his  friend's  new  brown; 

5 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

on  the  other  hand,  his  movements  were  not  devoid  of  a  certain 
lank  grace  such  as  the  gods  have  denied  to  rotundity. 

Yet  when  he  stepped  out  from  his  quaint  desk,  it  was  suddenly 
to  be  seen  that  the  young  man  limped,  on  his  left  foot:  that  this 
limp  was  not  accidental  or  temporary.  ...  A  lame  doctor:  so  it 
was  with  him.  And  yet  the  fire  with  which  he  spoke  was  surely  not 
born  of  the  pharmacopoeia.  .  .  . 

"  Take  it  in  the  large  —  that 's  all  I  ask !  Look  at  your  job  from 
a  social  standpoint.  I  tell  you,  it 's  just  these  Huns,  these  yellow- 
rich  Heths  and  Magees  and  Old  Dominion  Pickle  people  who  're 
rotting  the  heart  out  of  this  fine  old  town.  And  the  root  of  the 
whole  trouble's  in  their  debased  personal  ideals,  don't  you  see? 
'Get  on'  at  all  costs,  that's  the  motto:  slapping  their  money  in 
their  neighbors'  faces  and  shouting,  'Here's  what  counts!'  — 
spreading  their  degraded  standards  by  example  through  the 
community  —  yellow  materialism  gone  mad.  .  .  .  Oh,  I  know!  — 
I  know  it  is  n't  your  slave-driving  captains  only.  It 's  mainly  the 
women  pushing  from  behind  —  fat  horse-leeches'  daughters 
always  screaming  'more,  more'  —  when  there's  — " 

"Leeches!  Peaches,  you  mean!  You  ought  to  see — " 

"  When  there 's  no  way  to  get  any  more  but  to  bleed  it  out  of 
—  Corinne  Garland  here !  —  which  is  duly  done.  Brutal  egoism, 
that's  the  philosophy — " 

"Police!"  cried  O'Neill,  puffing  good-humoredly.  "Why, 
V.  V. !  —  They're  personally  some  of  the  best  people  in  town!  If 
you  knew  'em  you'd  be  the  first  to  say  so.  Take  the  Heths  now, 
just  to  show  you  — " 

"Huns  all!  I  do  know  them,  I  say,  through  to  their  little  pre 
hensile  souls!  You  don't  seem  to  get  me.  .  .  .  Why,  I  feel  sorry  for 
them,  Sam !  I  would  n't  mind  much  what  they  did  if  they  were 
only  happy  with  it!  But,  good  heavens!  .  .  .  D'  you  know 
what  this  age  needs,  my  boy?  A  voice  crying  in  the  wilder 
ness.  .  ." 

"H'm!  Don't  know  about  that.  You'll  find,  where  it's  a 
matter  touching  their  pockets,  people  don't  listen  to  voices 
much,  either  in — " 

"They  listened  to  John  the  Baptist!" 

6 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"What?"  said  Sam,  rather  disliking  these  constant  references 
to  the  ancient  days. 

"I  say  they  listened  to  John  the  Baptist!"  cried  tall  Dr. 
Vivian,  slapping  one  impetuous  hand  into  the  other.  "Yes,  and 
came  running  and  sweating  to  the  desert,  just  to  get  a  tongue- 
lashing  from  him  —  the  very  same  old  scribes  and  Pharisees  that 
drive  motor-cars  down  Washington  Street  to-day !  And  they  'd  run 
to  him  to-day,  never  fear!  I  tell  you,  there's  a  voice  the  heart  is 
never  deaf  to!  And  that's  what  this  age  needs,  Sam,  —  since  you 
ask  me,  —  a  big,  fierce  prophet  on  the  outskirts  of  the  city;  a 
great,  grim,  uncompromising  hater,  with  a  tongue  that  bites  like 
a  blacksnake  whip.  By  George,  they  'd  listen  to  him !  He  could  n't 
hide  where  your  yellow  Huns  would  n't  come  to  him  on  their 
knees!" 

"Let  him  do  it,  then,  —  go's  far  as  he  likes.  Only  don't  ask 
me  .  .  ." 

O'Neill  had  not  failed  to  perceive  how  the  talk  wandered  from 
the  Labor  Commission.  Now,  drawing  on  his  gloves,  he  was 
struck  by  a  humorous  thought. 

"You're  looking  for  work,  for  trouble,  you  say.  Why  don't 
you  sign  on  this  John  the  Baptist  job  yourself?" 

Oddly,  the  small  gibe  seemed  to  disconcert  the  orator.  His 
cheek  acquired  a  pinkness;  unexpectedly,  too,  he  seemed  to  lose 
the  thread  of  his  headlong  thesis.  However,  he  brandished  his 
arms,  gazing  hard. 

"That's  as  it  may  be!  As  it  may  be,  my  dear  fellow!  All 
I  ...  Ah,"  he  said  hurriedly,  turning.  "One  minute  .  .  .  There's 
some  one  knocking  ..." 

And  he  went  striding  off  with  his  unequal  step  toward  his 
visitors'  door  —  not  his  sick's —  though  it  did  seem  that  "  Come 
in"  would  really  have  answered  just  as  well  as  usual  .  .  . 

The  stoutish  Commissioner  glanced  after  him,  dimly  sur 
prised. 

Boyhood  friends  these  two,  their  ways  had  long  parted  while 
the  younger  followed  away  the  descending  fortunes  of  his  father, 
the  inventor  of  a  double-turbine  which  would  never  quite  work. 
Their  reestablished  intimacy  now  was  of  the  thorough-going  sort: 

7 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


witness  Sam's  letting  him  trot  along  on  factory  inspection  the 
other  day,  something  he  'd  have  done  for  no  other  amateur,  not  on 
your  life.  Yet  old  V.  V.  was  kind  of  puzzling  at  times,  as  now; 
wild-talking,  then  kind  of  reserved  all  of  a  sudden,  like  pulling 
down  a  shade  on  you.  Talked  different  at  different  times.  .  .  . 

Business  awaited  the  Commissioner  at  his  office  in  the  Capitol, 
as  he  now  recalled.  However,  V.  V.  was  opening  his  dingy  old 
door. 

Without,  in  the  corridor,  there  was  seen  standing  a  scraggly- 
bearded  individual  in  a  ragged  shirt,  which  offered  glimpses  of  a 
hairy  chest  in  need  of  soap.  A  stranger  this  chanced  to  be,  but 
the  genus  was  by  no  means  unfamiliar  in  the  environs  of  the 
Dabney  House.  The  young  doctor's  speaking  countenance,  con 
fronting  him,  appeared  to  fall  a  little.  Doubtless  he  had  learned 
by  now  the  usual  business  of  such  as  these. 

"Good  morning,"  he  said,  in  rather  a  firm  way.  "What  can  I 
do  for  you?" 

The  caller,  having  turned  a  china-blue  gaze  upon  his  host, 
wore  a  confused  air.  He  spoke  in  a  furry,  plaintive  voice,  profes 
sional  in  its  way. 

"Jes  lookin'  fer  the  Doc  a  minute,  sir,  that's  all.  You  ain't 
him,  are  yer?" 

"Why  not?  .  .  ." 

And  then  it  came  over  Vivian  who  this  man  must  be:  surely  no 
other  than  the  Dabney  House  prodigal,  spouse  of  his  own  fellow- 
lodger,  landlady,  and  blanchisseuse.  Upon  that  thought  he 
stepped  out  into  the  hall,  closing  the  office  door  behind  him  upon 
Sam  O'Neill. 

"Yes,  I'm  the  doctor  —  and  you're  Mr.  Garland,  are  n't  you? 
Your  wife  and  daughter  are  friends  of  mine  ..." 

Mr.  Garland  accepted  the  introduction  with  signs  of  abash 
ment,  but  stated  his  business  simply. 

"Doc,  could  you  he'p  me  out  with  a  coat  like?" 

"Oh.  ...  A  coat,  you  say?" 

"Rags  to  my  skin,  sir.  I  'clare  you  can  see  my  meat  .  .  ." 

The  bearded  one  inspected  himself  downward  with  feeble 
cackles,  hollow  parodies  of  gay  derision.  And  he  added,  with  the 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

same  mock  dash,  that  he  did  n't  mind  his  situation  for  himself, 
being  used  to  taking  them  as  they  come;  't  was  his  missus  seemed 
sort  of  shamed  fer  him  .  .  . 

The  pleasant-faced  young  man  stood  stroking  his  chin. 

"  Yes  —  yes  —  I  can  fit  you  out,  I  dare  say,"  said  he.  "I  — 
ah  —  have  a  coat  in  here  that  I  think  '11  do  you.  Very  nicely.  .  .  . 
S'pose  you  wait  here  a  moment,  and  we'll  see  —  what  we  shall 
see  .  .  ." 

He  disappeared  through  a  door  down  the  hall,  and  returned 
presently,  carrying  a  black  coat  of  the  sort  commonly  known  as 
a  cutaway. 

"  There 's  the  vest  that  goes  with  it,  too,"  said  he.  "  You  might 
as  well  have  that  —  though  of  course  Mrs.  Garland  may  have  to 
let  it  out  a  little  .  .  ." 

The  man  received  the  gifts  in  a  somewhat  awkward  silence. 
Having  eyed  the  proffered  coat,  —  which  in  this  dim  light  ap 
peared  to  be  quite  a  good  one,  newer-looking,  indeed,  than  the 
one  worn  at  present  by  the  doctor,  — •  his  gaze  wandered  up  and 
then  stealthily  away.  His  air  of  hesitancy  was  a  little  surprising. 

"In  the  seams,  you  know,"  said  V.  V.  "Make  it  bigger. 
She'll  understand  .  .  ." 

Then  thanks  came  from  the  furry  voice,  effusive  yet  somehow 
rather  sheepish:  perhaps  the  man  was  n't  as  experienced  at  this 
sort  of  thing  as  he  looked.  However,  he  shambled  away  with 
speed,  appearing  at  least  to  know  that  when  you  had  got  what 
you  wanted,  that,  and  no  other,  was  the  moment  to  go. 

Far  down  the  corridor  of  the  old  hotel,  he  turned  once,  looking 
back  furtively  over  his  shoulder.  .  .  . 

Vivian  reappeared  in  his  office,  to  be  greeted  with  a  grin  by 
Sam  O'Neill,  who,  having  just  thrown  his  cigar-end  into  the 
ruined  fireplace,  was  ready  to  go. 

"'Nother  beggar,  hey?" 

"No— no  .  .  .  Oh,  no!  "said  the  doctor,  hastily.  "Justa  — ah 
—  sort  of  a  fellow  wanted  to  see  me  ..." 

He  halted  in  the  middle  of  the  room;  stood  absently  pushing 
back  his  hair;  and  his  gaze,  turned  toward  the  window,  became 
introspective,  a  little  dreamy.  .  .  . 

9 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"  What  we  were  speaking  of,  Sam  .  .  .  Just  to  show  you  I  'm  not 
so  opinionated  —  so  eccentric  —  as  you  seem  to  think.  I  read  a 
great  little  thing  the  other  day  ...  In  a  magazine  article,  it  was, 
describing  one  of  those  so-called  public  balls  —  in  Chicago,  this 
one  was.  You  know  the  sort  of  thing  —  an  orgy:  rounders  and 
roues,  young  cheap  sports,  old  rakes,  all  the  demi-monde,  rivers 
of  alcohol  .  .  .  Drunken  women  kicking  men's  hats  off  and  lying 
where  they  fell  .  .  .  Regular  bacchanalia.  Well,  about  one  o'clock 
two  men  in  evening  clothes  came  into  the  gallery  and  stood 
looking  down  into  that  —  maelstrom  of  infamous  faces.  .  .  .  Then 
one  of  them  said:  '  John  the  Baptist  would  have  'em  all  grovelling 
in  three  minutes'  ..." 

He  had  told  his  story  with  a  certain  youthful  expectancy,  the 
air  of  one  who  confides,  counting  upon  a  delicate  understanding. 
But  Sam  O'Neill,  though  perfectly  willing  to  be  delicate,  could 
only  say,  after  an  anti-climacteric  pause:  "Is  that  right?  Well, 
that  bunch  needed  to  grovel  all  right"  —  which  was  a  little 
vague,  say  what  you  would  of  it,  chilling  somewhat.  .  .  . 

"Well,  what's  your  coryphees'  ball  but  life?"  muttered 
Vivian,  knocking  the  ashes  from  the  dead  pipe  he  had  been 
holding.  .  .  . 

And  then,  turning  away  with  the  fire  gone  out  of  him,  he 
added : 

"All  I  say  about  these  people  is  they'd  be  so  much  happier 
with  their  shells  hammered  off.  What's  getting  rich  but  building 
a  wall  between  yourself  and  the  great  common?  .  .  .  Seems  to  me 
God  meant  us  all  to  be  citizens  of  the  world  ..." 

"That's  right,"  said  Sam,  reassuringly.  And  then,  as  the  two 
men  walked  toward  the  door:  "Oh,  I  don't  say  that  letter  there'll 
do  any  harm,  V.  V.  Maybe  a  little  stirring  'em  up's  just  as 
well  .  .  ." 

At  the  door,  O'Neill  recollected,  and  spoke  again:  "Oh,  say, 
V.  V. !  Saw  your  gay  young  friend  Dalhousie  just  now.  Had  a 
pretty  nice  little  load  of  bananas  too  ..." 

V.  V.  halted  dead,  his  look  changing  abruptly.  Trouble 
gathered  on  his  brow. 

"Where?" 

10 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"Driving  down  Centre  Street  in  a  hack,  looking  sober  as  a 
judge,  but—" 

"What  sort  of  hack?"  demanded  Vivian,  as  if  a  good  deal 
might  depend  on  that. 

"Reg'lar  sea-going,"  answered  the  Commissioner,  confirming 
the  worst.  "  Kind  with  the  fold-back  top,  like  you  see  principally 
at  nigger  funerals  and  aldermen's  parades  ..." 

But  it  was  evidently  no  merry  matter  to  V.  V. 

"Then  he's  off,"  said  he,  slowly,  and  glanced  at  his 
watch.  ...  "He  seemed  all  right  when  I  saw  him  last  night. 
Only  you  never  can  tell,  with  him.  ...  I  wonder  if  I  could  catch 
him  .  .  ." 

The  Commissioner  thought  not.  "He  was  headed  straight  for 
Centre  Street  Station,  and  that  was  a  half-hour  ago.  Had  a  bag 
out  front  in  the  sea-going,  too.  Oh,  thunder,  he 's  all  right.  Little 
trip  '11  do  him  good  ..." 

Left  alone  in  his  office,  V.  Vivian  stood  still,  staring  intently 
into  space. 

New-returned  to  his  old  home  town,  this  young  man  was  deep 
in  love  with  twenty  gallant  schemes,  from  the  general  reform  of 
the  world,  by  his  own  system,  to  the  repairment  of  the  stomachic 
equipment  of  Tubby  Miggs,  aged  six.  But  O'Neill's  tidings  of 
the  vehicular  lad  knocked  them  all  from  his  mind.  He  forgot  the 
Huns;  forgot  John  the  Baptist;  forgot  even  his  sick,  till  one  of  the 
weller  of  them  (as  we  may  assume)  knocked  memorially  upon  his 
door.  .  .  . 

What  trouble  was  brewing  for  his  frail  friend  Dal? 

Upon  this  matter,  now  and  henceforward,  the  other  House  was 
to  have  information  first.  Dusk  of  that  day  had  fallen  before  the 
word  came  to  the  deserted  hotel.  But  when  it  did  come,  the  lame 
doctor  broke  his  evening  office-hour  without  notice,  and  caught  a 
train  by  thirty  seconds. 


II 


Two  Persons  of  More  Importance,  and  why  they  went  to  the 
Beach  in  October;  Miss  Carlisle  Heth,  and  how  she  met  an 
unwelcome  swain  at  Sea;  how  this  Swain  could  swim  enough 
for  one. 

MR.  HETH  perused  the  Severe  Arraignment  of  himself 
about  nine  o'clock,  over  his  second  cup  of  coffee.  He 
perused  with  indignation;  but,  being  long  since  trained 
to  keep  a  neat  partition  between  downtown  and  uptown,  he  did 
not  divulge  his  sentiments  to  the  breakfast- table,  and  even  carried 
the  paper  off  with  him  to  the  office.  By  such  demeanor,  he  abdi 
cates  our  present  notice.  Mrs.  Heth,  hours  later,  bought  a  copy 
of  the  "Post"  from  a  uniformed  newsboy,  to  see  what  they  had 
to  say  of  the  Associated  Charities  meeting  on  the  evening  preced 
ing,  and  of  her  remarks  in  accepting  the  office  of  First  Vice- 
President.  Absorbed  by  this  particular  piece-in-the-paper,  —  for 
so  the  good  lady  named  all  journalistic  efforts,  from  dry-goods 
advertisements  to  leading  editorials  on  Trouble  in  the  Balkans, 
—  it  was  past  three-thirty  o'clock,  post-meridian,  or  well  after 
luncheon,  before  her  eye  chanced  to  alight  on  the  Dabney  House's 
winged  words. 

At  this  hour  the  ladies  sat  at  ease  in  their  private  sitting-room 
on  the  seventh  floor  of  the  great  handsome  caravansary  by  the 
sea.  For  to-day,  as  it  falls  out,  the  House  of  Heth,  just  as  we 
have  it  so  firmly  fixed  on  Washington  Street,  had  split  and 
transplanted  itself;  all  that  mattered  of  it,  the  soul  and  genius  of 
the  House,  having  flitted  off  seventy  miles  to  the  Beach  for  an 
over-Sunday  rest. 

It  was  the  2gth  of  October,  which  should  have  meant  grate- 
fires.  On  the  contrary,  two  windows  in  the  rented  sitting-room 
were  open,  and  Miss  Carlisle  Heth,  laying  down  "Pickwick 

12 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Papers,"  by  Dickens,  the  well-known  writer,  now  rose  and  flung 
wide  the  third. 

"Whew!"  said  she,  just  as  an  ordinary  person  might  have 
done.  "It's  stifling!" 

Her  mother,  a  lifelong  conservative,  presently  replied: 

"It  is  n't  the  heat,  it's  the  humidity." 

Carlisle  looked  out  over  the  sunny  sea,  and  wondered  if  her 
mother  were  never  going  to  take  her  nap.  She  was  twenty-three 
years  old,  and,  Hun  or  no  Hun,  was  certainly  not  displeasing  to 
the  fleshly  eye.  Also,  she  much  desired  to  pass  the  time  with  a 
little  sail,  having  already  privately  engaged  a  catboat  for  that 
express  purpose.  There  was  no  reason  whatever  why  she 
should  n't  have  the  sail,  except  that  her  mother  was  opposed  on 
principle  to  anything  that  looked  the  least  bit  adventurous. 

"There  are  cinders  on  me  yet,  in  spite  of  my  bath,"  added 
Mrs.  Heth,  whisking  through  the  less  interesting  pieces  in  the 
"Post."  .  .  .  "Willie's  train  arrives  at  four-thirty,  I  believe?" 

Miss  Heth  confirmed  the  belief. 

"I  wonder,  really,"  mused  the  dowager,  not  for  the  first  time, 
"what  attraction  the  place  can  offer  Mr.  Canning.  Men  are 
strange  in  their  choice  of  amusement,  to  say  the  least." 

"He's  tired  of  the  hermit  life,  and  wants  to  let  down  his  bars 
and  have  a  little  fun." 

"He  could  have  all  the  fun  he  wants  in  town,  Cally.  He  has 
only  to  make  a  sign  — " 

"Of  course!  —  and  be  snowed  under  with  invitations  which 
would  be  odious  to  him,  and  probably  roped  in  for  something  by 
Helen  and  Sue  Louise  Cheriton,  say.  He  can  have  fun  here,  with 
out  its  leading  to  anything." 

She  added,  with  perverse  merriment:  "At  least  he  thinks  he 
can,  not  knowing  that  two  enterprising  strangers  are  camping 
right  across  his  little  trail." 

Mrs.  Heth  frowned  slightly.  She  was  a  slim,  rather  small  lady, 
and  her  fair  face,  at  first  sight,  suggested  an  agreeable  delicacy. 
To  herself  she  acknowledged  with  pleasure  that  she  was  "spir- 
ituelle."  To  the  observer,  after  a  glance  at  her  attractive  upper 
face,  the  thick  jaw  and  neck  came  as  a  surprise:  so  did  the  hands 

13 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

and  feet.  The  feet,  seen  casually  in  a  company,  were  apt  to  be 
taken  for  the  belongings  of  some  far  stouter  woman,  sitting  near. 
They  were  Mrs.  Heth's,  however;  and  she  had  also  a  small  round 
birthmark  on  her  left  temple,  which  a  deft  arrangement  of  the 
hair  almost  concealed,  and  a  small  dark  mustache,  which  was  not 
so  fortunately  placed.  She  was  sane  and  sound  as  to  judgment, 
and  her  will  had  raised  the  House  of  Heth  as  by  a  steam  derrick. 

Miss  Heth,  gazing  down  at  three  or  four  hardy  bathers,  who 
splashed  and  shouted  at  the  hotel  float,  said,  laughing: 

"Truly,  mamma,  what  do  you  suppose  the  Cheritons  would 
have  given  Willie  for  the  splendid  tip?" 

Mrs.  Heth's  frown  at  her  newspaper  deepened;  otherwise  she 
made  no  response.  She  learned  with  difficulty,  like  a  Bourbon; 
but  many  years'  experience  had  at  last  convinced  her  that  her 
daughter's  occasional  mocking  mannerism  had  to  be  put  up  with. 
Conceivably  there  were  people  in  the  world  who  might  have 
liked  this  mild  cynical  way  of  Carlisle's,  seeing  in  it,  not  indeed  a 
good  quality,  but,  so  to  say,  the  seamy  side  of  a  good  quality;  the 
lingering  outpost  of  a  good  quality  that  had  been  routed ;  at  least 
the  headstone  over  the  grave  of  a  good  quality  that  maybe  was 
only  buried  alive.  But  of  these  people,  if  such  there  were,  Mrs. 
Heth  was  positively  not  one.  .  .  . 

And  Carlisle's  next  remark  was:  "What  would  you  wear  to 
night,  for  the  occasion?  .  .  .  Oh,  there 's  a  big  motor-boat  going 
by  like  the  wind." 

For  though  she  might  sometimes  jeer  aloud  over  processes,  the 
daughter  was  known  to  be  quite  as  serious  at  heart  as  her 
mother,  over  the  great  matters  of  life.  Otherwise,  look  you,  she 
might  not  have  been  at  the  Beach  at  all  to-day.  The  fact  was 
that  she  and  mamma  had  not  positively  decided  on  this  recupera 
tive  excursion  (though  they  had  practically  decided)  until  after 
the  arrival  of  Cousin  Willie  Kerr's  notelet  at  breakfast :  in  which 
notelet  Willie  mentioned  laconically  that  he  and  Mr.  Canning 
were  themselves  going  Beachward  by  the  three  o'clock  train,  and 
concluded  his  few  lines  with  verbum  sap,  which  is  a  Latin  quotation. 

Standing  idly  at  the  window,  the  girl  had  indeed  been  think 
ing  of  Mr.  Canning  before  her  mother  spoke;  and  thinking  with 

14 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

most  pleasurable  speculations.  Truly  he  was  worth  a  thought, 
was  Mr.  Canning,  proud  stranger  within  the  gates  —  "house- 
guest,"  as  the  society  column  prefers  it  —  for  whom,  if  reports 
were  true,  many  ladies  fair  had  sighed,  sickened,  and  died.  And 
she,  alone  in  her  maidenly  coterie,  had  already  met  the  too  exclu 
sive  metropolitan  —  four  days  ago,  by  the  lucky  fluke  of  turning 
in  at  the  Country  Club  at  an  out-of-the-way  morning  moment, 
when  she  might  have  motored  straight  on  home,  and  had  been 
within  an  ace  of  doing  so.  An  omen,  was  n't  it?  Five  minutes  she 
and  Mr.  Canning  had  talked,  over  so-called  horses'  necks  pro 
vided  by  his  sedate  host,  and  before  the  end  of  that  time  she  had 
perceived  an  interest  dawning  in  the  young  man's  somewhat 
ironic  eyes.  With  the  usual  of  his  sex  one  could  have  counted 
pretty  definitely  on  the  thing 's  being  followed  up.  However,  Mr. 
Canning,  the  difficult,  had  merely  saluted  her  fascinatingly,  and 
retired  to  re-maroon  himself  in  the  rural  villa  of  his  kinsmen,  the 
Allison  Paynes,  where  he  halted  for  a  week  or  two  on  his  health- 
seeking  progress  southward. 

It  looked  like  a  parting  forever,  but  was  n't,  owing  to  that  help 
which  comes  ever  to  those  who  help  themselves.  .  .  . 

To  the  sensible  query,  Mrs.  Heth,  lightening,  replied:  "Of 
course,  the  gray  crepe-de-chine." 

"I  think  so,  too.  Only  there's  a  rip  at  the  bottom.  I'm  sure 
Flora  has  n't  touched  it  since  Mr.  Avery  put  his  large  foot  straight 
through  it." 

Having  turned  from  the  window,  Carlisle  yawned  and  glanced 
at  the  clock.  The  two  ladies  conversed  desultorily  of  draped 
effects,  charmeuse,  and  why  Mattie  Allen  imagined  that  she  could 
wear  pink.  Mrs.  Heth  ran  on  through  the  "Post."  Carlisle  put 
up  "  Pickwick,"  by  Dickens,  sticking  in  a  box  of  safety  matches  to 
keep  the  place.  Then  she  examined  herself  in  the  mirror  over  the 
mantel,  and  became  intensely  interested  in  a  tiny  redness  over 
her  left  eyebrow.  She  thought  that  rubbing  in  a  little  powder, 
and  then  rubbing  it  right  off,  would  help  the  redness,  and  it  did. 

"I  asked  Mattie  why  she  said  such  long  prayers  in  the  morn 
ings.  That  was  what  made  me  late  for  breakfast.  Her  feelings 
were  quite  hurt.  Is  n't  her  devoutness  quaint,  though?" 

15 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"  She  uses  my  house,"  murmured  Mrs.  Heth,  "  like  a  hotel.  One 
would  think  it  might  occur  to  her  that  if  she  must  mummer  like 
a  deacon  she  ought  to  get  up  — " 

She  broke  off,  her  wandering  eye  having  just  then  fallen  upon 
the  Arraignment. 

"  She  did  n't  like  our  packing  her  off  right  after  breakfast  a  bit 
either.  .  .  .  I'm  devoted  to  her,"  said  Carlisle,  gently  rubbing  off 
the  powder,  "but  there's  no  denying  there's  a  great  deal  of  the 
cat  in  Mats." 

"Hmph!  .  .  .  Why,  this  is  outrageous!  I  never  read  such  a 
thing!" 

"What  is  it?"  said  the  daughter,  not  turning,  clearly  not  in 
terested. 

"Here's  a  man  saying  he  visited  the  Works  with  the  Labor 
Commissioner,  and  that  conditions  there  are  homicidal  I  I  never! 
Mmm-m-m.  Here!  'I  speak  particularly  of  the  Heth  Cheroot 
Works,  but  all  four  stand  almost  equally  as  burning  blots  upon 
the  conscience  of  this  community'  — " 

Carlisle's  attention  was  not  diverted  from  her  eyebrow.  "The 
Works!  He's  crazy.  .  .  .  Who  is  the  man?" 

"A  piece  in  the  paper  here  —  let  me  see.  Yes,  here's  his  name. 
Vivian.  V.  Vivian/  There's  no  such  man!  ..." 

"Oh,"  said  the  girl,  absently,  "it's  only  some  notoriety-seeking 
nobody.  .  .  .  Like  the  man  who  threw  the  brick  at  papa  that 
election  night." 

"But  nobodies  haven't  any  right  to  publish  such  untruths!" 
said  Mrs.  Heth,  more  grammatical  than  she  sounded.  "They 
ought  to  be  punished,  imprisoned  for  it.  'Public  opinion  is 
the  grandfather  of  statute-book  law.'  Where's  the  sense  in 
that? . . ." 

"It's  probably  one  of  those  Socialistic  things  .  .  .  They  said 
the  man  who  threw  the  brick  at  papa  was  a  Socialist." 

"'Shameless  egoists  of  industry  —  grow  rich  by  homicide!' 
I  'm  greatly  surprised  at  Mr.  West  for  printing  such  fanatical 
stuff.  I  trust  your  father  did  not  see  this.  He  gave  forty  dol 
lars  to  the  tuberculosis  fund,  and  this  is  his  reward." 

She  fumed  and  interjected  awhile  further,  but  her  daughter's 

16 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

thought  had  dreamed  far  away.  From  her  childhood  days  she 
had  carried  a  mind's-eye  picture  of  the  dominant  fourth  member 
of  the  family,  the  great  Works,  lord  and  giver  of  her  higher  life, 
which  completely  refuted  these  occasional  assaults  from  social 
ists  and  failures.  Their  malicious  bricks  flew  high  over  her  girl 
ish  head.  Presently  Mrs.  Heth  rose,  looking  about  for  her  novel, 
which  was  a  glittering  new  one,  frankly  for  entertainment  only, 
and  not  half-cultural  like  "Pickwick."  The  two  ladies  moved 
together  for  the  bedrooms. 

"You  had  better  get  a  little  nap,  too/'  said  Mrs.  Heth,  "to  be 
fresh  for  the  evening." 

"It's  so  early  now.  Perhaps  I  may  stroll  down  for  a  few 
minutes  first." 

"Well  —  it's  so  quiet  I  feel  as  if  we  had  the  place  to  ourselves. 
But  come  up  in  plenty  of  time  for  a  nap  before  dinner.  . . .  You  're 
here  to  get  two  days  of  good  rest." 

"I'll  shut  the  door  between,"  said  Carlisle. 

Before  long,  from  the  mother's  side  of  the  door  so  shut,  certain 
sounds  arose  indicating  that  after  the  morning's  fitful  fever  she 
slept  well.  Carlisle,  on  her  own  side,  quickly  donned  a  white 
boating-dress,  a  blue  fillet  for  her  hair,  and  white  doeskin  shoes 
with  rubber  soles.  That  done,  she  went  out  through  the  sitting- 
room,  shot  down  in  the  lift,  traversed  the  forsaken  lobby,  and 
emerged  upon  the  long  empty  boating  pavilion  which  ran  from 
the  hotel's  side-entrance  well  out  over  the  water. 

"The  bell-boy  gave  you  my  message,  Mr.  Wedge?"  said  she, 
to  the  weather-tanned  renter  of  boats.  "How  do  you  do?  I'm 
late.  How's  the  little  Lady  Jane?" 

"How  you,  Miss  Heth?  Glad  to  see  you  back  again,  Miss. 
Lady  Jane's  trim  as  ever.  Yes'm.  And  there's  a  little  sou' 
breeze  coming  up  —  puffy,  but  just  suit  her." 

"Bring  her  up  a  little  more." 

"Yes'm  —  there  now!  Feels  most  like  summer,  don't  it?" 

"But  it  does  n't  look  like  it!"  smiled  Miss  Heth,  and  glanced 
about  at  the  emptiness  of  things. 

"You'd  ought  to  of  seen  her  afore  the  hot  spell,"  replied  Mr. 
Wedge,  with  artificial  hilarity.  .  .  . 

17 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


Then  the  light  air  took  the  little  sail  and  Carlisle  slid  away 
with  the  sunshine  on  her  hair. 

For  half  a  week  the  breath  of  summer  had  confounded  October, 
mid-autumn  plucking  a  leaf  from  July's  best  book.  Now,  with  the 
half-holiday  at  hand  and  a  Sabbath  to  follow,  a  few  others  beside 
the  Heths  and  the  Willie  Kerr  select  party  had  deemed  it  worth 
while  to  go  down  to  the  sea  where  the  breezes  blow.  Only  a  few, 
though:  the  desolate  quiet  of  a  summer  place  out  of  season  yet 
clung  and  hung  over  all.  In  a  solitary  corner  of  the  vast  piazza 
four  coatless  men  sat  idly  drinking  the  rickeys  of  summer. 
These,  indeed,  watched  the  embarkation  of  the  girl  with  interest, 
and  when  she  stood  a  moment  to  get  a  knot  out  of  the  sheet,  re 
vealing  the  figure  of  the  Huntswoman  (though  she  was  by  no 
means  one  of  your  great  Amazons),  one  of  them  might  have  been 
heard  to  say: 

"Well,  she  can  have  me  any  time.  .  . .  And,  by  crackey,  she 
can  sail!" 

The  remark  betrayed  the  hypnotic  influence:  for  she  really 
could  not  sail  very  well.  No  athlete  this  lady;  she  had  even 
let  her  saddle-horse  go  after  the  purchase  of  the  second  car;  the 
sail  now  stood  as  her  sole  sporting  activity,  and  that  but  lately 
taken  up.  However,  she  handled  her  bark  with  a  tolerable 
efficiency.  Keeping  prudently  inshore,  yet  feeling  delightfully 
venturesome,  she  skimmed  along  by  the  row  of  shut-up  cottages, 
and  was  soon  lost  to  the  stare  of  the  rickey-drinkers,  of  whose 
interest  she  had  been  quite  unaware,  or,  let  us  say,  practically 
unaware.  .  .  . 

Not  for  the  eyes  of  anonymous  transients  or  liberal-minded 
drummers  had  Carlisle  Heth  donned  this  charming  boat-dress 
and  put  out  upon  the  bounding  blue.  Not  just  to  break  the 
tedium  of  the  afternoon,  either;  not  even  exclusively  for  the  vast 
exhilaration  of  sailing,  though  undoubtedly  she  thrilled  to  that. 
But  the  interesting  coincidence,  giving  a  peculiar  point  to  it  all, 
was  that  the  three  o'clock  train  from  town  was  due  within  the 
half-hour,  and  her  present  course  lay  dead  across  the  line  of  the 
street  from  the  station. 

Travel- worn  young  men;  desolate  Beach;  chagrin  at  coming; 

18 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


and  then,  presto,  upon  the  jaded  vision : — blue,  sunny  water,  white- 
sailed  boat,  beautiful  nymph.  Great  heavens,  what  a  tableau !  .  .  . 

We  well  know  how  resistlessly  the  male  of  humankind  is  drawn 
to  the  female,  at  the  mere  glimpse  of  her  flinging  aside  the  tools 
of  his  trade,  whatever  it  may  be,  and  furiously  pursuing  to  the 
ends  of  the  earth.  And  we  know,  too  (for  the  true  poets  of  all 
ages  have  told  us),  how  the  female  of  our  species  goes  her  inno 
cent  ways  full  of  artless  fancies  and  sweet  girlish  imaginings,  all 
unaware  that  an  opposite  and  uproarious  sex  is  in  headlong  pur 
suit.  And  how  she  springs  up  startled  from  her  otherworldly 
dreams,  to  hear  the  thundering  feet  behind  .  .  . 

Yet  we  do  know  also  of  cases  everywhere  which  make  familiar 
principles  not  merely  out  of  place,  but  fairly  grotesque.  You  are 
hardly  to  conceive  Miss  Heth's  pretty  tableau  as  staged  for,  her 
prospecting  journey  to  the  Beach  as  concerned  with,  some  or 
dinary  male,  of  whom  one  could  expect  that  he  would  pursue 
^ven  extraordinary  maids  in  an  ordinary  way  .  .  . 

The  nymph  sailed  gayly,  stimulated  by  agreeable  anticipa 
tions.  The  minutes  danced  by  with  the  skipping  waves.  A  gust  of 
wind  slapped  the  solitary  little  canvas,  and  Carlisle's  small  but 
not  incapable  hand  tightened  upon  the  sheet.  Her  eye  went 
dreamily  over  water  and  strand.  Far  down  the  shore,  boys  were 
swimming  with  faint  yells,  but  the  hotel  bathers  had  tired  and 
gone  in.  She  seemed  to  have  the  great  Atlantic  to  herself,  and  the 
fact  seemed  nice  to  her,  and  refined.  .  .  . 

The  years  had  passed  since  Carlisle  Heth  had  formulated  the 
careering  importance,  even  the  nobility,  of  marrying  high  above 
her.  Aspiration,  not  your  ditchwater  cynicism,  was  the  main 
spring  of  her  real  being,  as  her  mother  well  knew;  and  this  su 
preme  fulfilment  had  long  glittered  ahead  as  the  ultimate  crown, 
not  of  triumph  only,  but  of  happiness  consummate.  A  little  too 
long,  perhaps:  waiting  princesses  grow  discontented.  Vague  dis 
satisfactions  possessed  the  girl  at  times,  for  all  her  large  blessings ; 
mild  symptoms  stewed  and  simmered  from  her  which  surprised 
her  in  reflective  moments,  and  her  mother  at  all  moments. 
These  things,  she  knew  well,  came  all  from  a  single  want.  Her 
reach  far  exceeded  her  grasp.  Her  sighs  were  Alexander's. 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Now,  in  the  smiling  and  anticipatory  afternoon,  a  limpid  brook 
of  girlish  imaginings  beguiled  her  with  enchanting  music,  while 
realer  water  lapped  her  shallop,  and  the  substantial  breeze 
whipped  her  glorious  hair  about  her  yet  more  glorious  face.  This 
face,  it  is  time  to  say  plainly,  attracted  more  than  rickey-drink- 
ers.  Good  men  might  here  read  their  dearest  dreams  come  true; 
had  so  read  them.  The  fact  deserves  capitals,  being  enormously 
important.  With  one  half  the  world  only,  as  all  know,  is  charac 
ter  destiny:  the  rest  is  bent  and  twisted,  glorified  or  smashed,  by 
Physiognomy,  the  great  potter. 

And  this  girl's  destiny  was  obviously  magnificent.  Experience 
had  long  since  convinced  her,  personally,  of  that.  Hoarse  testi 
monials  from  the  pursuing  sex  she  had  had  in  superabundance 
from  her  fifteenth  year.  Yet,  while  these  were  duly  valued  as 
indicating  the  strong  demand,  she  had  waited,  stanch  to  her 
destiny.  Were  not  Alexandrine  sighs  her  right?  One  so  endowed 
could  hardly  be  asked  to  rest  content  with  the  youth  of  the 
vicinage.  .  .  . 

The  cottage  row  was  now  well  astern;  the  long  string  of  empty 
bathhouses  slid  by;  water  foamed  under  the  swelling  sail. 
Gliding  with  the  bark,  dreamy  retrospect  met  and  joined  hands 
with  solider  prospect.  Carlisle  threw  round  a  measuring  eye,  and 
perceived  that  she  had  covered  more  distance  than  she  had 
thought;  had  passed  the  limits  of  the  board-walk  and  the  beach, 
which  was  quite  far  enough,  considering.  She  luffed  cleverly,  hav 
ing  a  splendid  blowy  time  of  it,  and  put  about.  This  done,  she 
permitted  herself  to  glance  for  the  second  time  over  the  purview. 

No  cloud  of  smoke  stood  upon  the  horizon  stationward,  no 
human  being  appeared  within  such  view  of  the  strand  as  the 
cottages  and  bath-houses  left  to  her.  The  train,  evidently,  was 
late.  Well,  as  far  as  that  went,  there  was  no  special  hurry  about 
getting  back  to  the  hotel.  Mamma  could  only  scold  a  little,  as  usual. 

Carlisle  smiled  to  herself,  rather  tickled  by  the  thought  of  the 
brilliant  march  she  and  mamma  had  stolen  upon  the  world.  In 
five  minutes,  under  stiff  Mr.  Payne's  eye  at  that,  she  had  indu 
bitably  interested  Mr.  Canning.  And  now,  thanks  chiefly  to 
Willie  Kerr's  loyal  enterprise,  .  .  . 

20 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Her  returning  eye  fell  upon  a  bobbing  object  in  the  water,  very 
near  her,  and  her  heart  missed  a  beat.  Her  lips  moved  sound 
lessly.  Jack  Dalhousie!  .  .  . 

The  bobbing  object,  in  fact,  was  the  head  of  a  man  of  the  sea; 
a  youthful  swimmer  who  had  come  up  on  her  unseen  —  behind 
her  till  she  had  put  about.  The  lad  was  swimming  rapidly, 
though  with  a  curious  waste  of  motive  power,  and  was  so  close 
that  Miss  Heth  seemed  to  herself  to  be  staring  full  into  his  face. 
His  course  was  laid  dead  across  her  bows;  for  other  reasons,  too, 
his  piratical  intentions  were  instantly  obvious  to  the  girl  in  the 
boat. 

How  did  he  dare !  —  after  all  these  months  .  .  . 

For  an  exciting  second  she  plotted  escape  by  flight,  but  the 
impulse  was  all  but  still-born.  He  would  be  on  her  before  she 
could  put  about.  The  girl  sat  entirely  still,  regarding  the  swim 
mer  in  a  kind  of  fascinated  silence.  The  irony  of  fate,  indeed, 
that,  at  a  moment  when  her  whole  mind  and  heart  were  toward 
the  rose-pink  future,  this  scapegrace  ghost  from  her  only  "past" 
should  have  risen  out  of  the  sea  upon  her.  To  dream  of  a  Can 
ning,  and  be  entrapped  by  a  Dalhousie !  .  .  . 

The  youth  sloshed  alongside,  laid  hold  of  the  boat's  nose,  and 
methodically  and  with  some  difficulty  pulled  himself  in.  The 
weight  of  his  ingress  tipped  the  gunwale  to  the  water's  edge,  but 
Carlisle  made  no  outcry.  She  was  clear  of  head;  and  the  heart  of 
her  desire  was  to  be  free  of  this  misadventure  without  attracting 
attention  from  the  shore. 

She  said  in  a  sharp,  clear  voice:  "Mr.  Dalhousie,  are  you  per 
fectly  crazy?" 

Dalhousie,  in  his  swimmer's  suit,  sat  stiffly  forward,  sluicing 
water  into  the  bottom.  He  was  a  big  and  well-built  boy,  with  a 
face  that  had  no  viciousness;  but  his  dark  eyes,  with  their  heavy 
silken  lashes,  were  hardly  meant  for  a  man.  Neither  was  his 
mouth,  for  all  that  he  sought  to  set  it  so  firmly  now. 

"Mr.  Dalhousie,"  he  repeated  with  elaborate  distinctness. 
"When  d'  I  —  draw  that  —  title? " 

The  girl  sat  eyeing  him  with  frosty  calm:  a  look  which  covered 
rage  within,  not  unmingled  with  perturbation.  .  .  . 

21 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

He  was  a  neighbor  of  hers,  this  audacious  youth,  though  not  of 
Washington  Street;  impecunious,  and  hence  negligible;  moreover 
somewhat  notorious  of  late  for  a  too  vivid  behavior:  the  distant 
bowing  acquaintance  of  many  years.  This  till  the  moment  of 
indiscretion  last  May;  when,  encountering  his  dashing  attrac 
tions  in  the  boredom  of  a  dull  resort,  far  from  her  mother's  restric 
tive  eye,  she  had  for  an  idle  fortnight  allowed  the  relation  between 
them  to  become  undeniably  changed.  Foolish  indeed;  but  really 
she  had  thought  —  or  now  really  thought  she  had  thought  — 
that  the  impossible  youth  took  it  all  no  more  seriously  than  she. 
Not  till  her  return  home  last  month  had  he  revealed  his  com 
plete  untrustworthiness:  presuming,  as  she  termed  it,  making 
claims  and  advances,  putting  her  to  trouble  to  keep  her  vernal  un 
wisdom  from  her  mother.  Still,  she  had  thought  she  had  disposed 
of  him  at  last.  .  .  . 

Now  there  sat  the  unwelcome  swain,  her  boarder,  so  close  that 
she  could  have  touched  him.  And  her  gaze  upon  him  was  like 
arctic  snowblink:  an  odd  look  in  pretty  young  eyes. 

"You've  no  right  to  force  yourself  upon  me  in  this  way,"  said 
she.  "You  must  get  out  of  my  boat  at  once." 

"Oh,  no,  I  must  n't,  Carlisle.  That's  where  you  make  —  mis 
take.  You  've  put  me  off  —  too  often.  Now  —  the  time 's  come." 

"You  must  be  out  of  your  senses.  This  is  outrageous.  I  insist 
— I  demand  that  you  get  out  of  my  boat  immediately." 

"When  d'  ju  —  listen  when  I  —  demanded?" 

His  heavy  resoluteness  reduced  her  suddenly  to  the  weakness 
of  saying:  "A  gentleman  wouldn't  do  such  a  thing.  .  .  .You 
will  regret  this." 

"Man,"  said  Dalhousie,  with  the  same  labored  slowness, 
"  comes  before  gen'leman.  An'  the  regrets  —  will  be  yours.  I  Ve 
come  —  to  have  a  talk." 

In  the  momentary  silence,  the  drip,  drip  from  his  bathing-suit 
became  very  audible.  The  lad  leaked  like  a  sieve,  all  over  her 
boat.  Miss  Heth  glanced  swiftly  and  vexedly  from  him,  over  the 
unchanged  panorama.  Empty  water  lapping  empty  beach;  no 
one  watching.  Only  now,  in  the  sky  over  the  station,  there  hung 
a  haze  of  train-smoke.  .  .  . 

22 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Her  eyes  came  back:  and  now  she  observed  with  some  girlish 
anxiety  the  young  man's  unwonted  solemnity,  the  strange  bril 
liance  of  his  eyes.  A  certain  nervousness  began  to  show  through 
her  cold  calm :  her  unconscious  hand  wound  the  taut  sheet  round 
and  round  the  tiller,  an  injudicious  business  in  view  of  the  gusty 
breeze.  How  to  be  rid  most  quickly  of  the  interloper?  .  .  .  She 
might,  of  course,  put  ashore  with  him:  but  she  particularly  did 
not  care  to  do  that,  and  have  all  the  piazza  loungers  and  gossips 
see  her  in  his  somewhat  too  gay  company.  Most  particularly  she 
did  not  care  to  have  her  mother  glance  out  of  her  upstairs  win 
dow  and  be  stunned  by  the  same  sight,  with  apoplectic  cross- 
examination  to  follow  .  .  . 

"Jack,"  said  Carlisle  Heth,  hurriedly,  in  rather  a  coaxing  sort 
of  voice,  "if  you  will  leave  me  now,  I  will  —  I  promise  to  see  you 
in  town  next  week." 

A  flicker  touched  Dalhousie's  eyelid;  but  he  said  huskily,  after 
a  pause:  "Promise?  What's  your  promise  worth?  You've  pro 
mised  me  before.  You  said  —  you  loved  —  " 

"I  can't  talk  now.  But  on  Monday  afternoon  —  in  the  park  — 
or  at  my  house  —  whichever  you  prefer  ...  I  —  I  '11  explain.  I 
give  you  my  word  of  honor  — " 

"No!  You've  done  that  before  —  too.  Explain!  Howc'n  you 
explain?  Goon.  Try  now.  Why 've  you  —  refused  to  see  me? 
Why—" 

Red  stained  the  girl's  cheeks. 

"Then  you'll  force  me  to  put  in  immediately,"  she  said,  with 
an  angry  reversal  of  tactics, —  "and  subject  me  to  the  humilia 
tion  of  being  seen  with  you.  What  a  coward!" 

"Humiliation!"  Dalhousie  repeated,  flushing  vividly.  "You 
say  that?" 

"Can't  you  understand  that  it  would  be?  Are  you  really  so 
stupid?  Have  n't  you  learned  yet  that  I  don't  ever  want  any 
thing  more  to  do  with  you?  ..." 

Such  remarks  brought  action  and  reaction.  The  lad's  look 
must  have  warned  Miss  Heth  that  all  this  went  rather  far.  In 
fact,  she  began  a  sort  of  retraction,  a  hurried  little  soothing 
away  of  her  impolitic  and  fairly  conclusive  remarks.  But  Dal- 

23 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

housie  interrupted  her,  rising  unsteadily  in  the  boat,  his  young 
face  quite  strange  and  wild. 

Who  would  scrutinize  the  dying  flickers  of  last  summer's  flirta 
tion?  All  that  mattered  was  only  too  well  seen  from  the  shore. 

It  was  the  smallest  of  the  rickey-drinkers  who  bruited  the  mis 
hap  abroad,  his  eye  having  happened  to  stray  through  a  slit  be 
tween  a  cottage-side  and  a  boat-house.  At  this  time,  with  the 
approach  of  evening  coolness,  the  hotel  piazza  was  filling  up  a 
little ;  and  at  the  man's  word,  the  place  was  instantly  in  a  turmoil. 

There  started,  in  fact,  all  the  horrid  rigors  of  amateur  rescue 
work:  of  which  the  least  said  the  soonest  mended.  It  was  pre 
sently  noted  by  some  coolhead  that  the  renter  of  boats,  having 
seen  the  disaster  first,  had  already  put  out  for  the  scene  of 
trouble,  rowing  lustily.  Nobody  could  beat  him  to  his  garlands 
now;  that  was  clear;  clear,  too,  that  there  really  was  n't  much 
peril,  after  all.  So  the  motley  gathering  of  idlers  became  content 
to  stand  upon  the  edge  of  the  boat  pavilion,  gazing  most  eagerly, 
gossiping  not  a  little.  .  .  . 

The  bystander,  like  the  Athenian,  ever  desires  to  see  or  to  hear 
some  new  thing.  And  really  this  spectacle  was  new  enough  to 
satisfy  the  most  exacting. 

Perhaps  a  mile  over  the  water,  a  hundred  yards  or  so  from 
shore,  the  little  boat  Lady  Jane  lay  side  up  on  the  sea.  To  it 
clung  a  young  girl,  well  above  water;  near  her  appeared  the  head 
of  a  young  man,  a  swimmer.  So  far,  so  good.  But  there  was 
something  wrong  about  this  swimmer,  something  grossly  dis 
cordant  in  his  position  in  the  picture.  It  developed  upon  close 
examination  that  the  interval  between  him  and  the  overturned 
boat  was  not  decreasing.  It  was  widening  indeed ;  widening  quite 
steadily.  .  .  .  Yes,  there  it  was;  unfortunately  no  longer  open  to 
doubt.  The  man  was  pulling  for  the  shore  and  safety,  leaving  the 
girl  to  sink  or  swim  as  she  preferred. 

The  sight  was  a  strange  one,  resembling  a  defiance  of  estab 
lished  law.  It  staggered  the  eye,  like  the  sight  of  water  running 
uphill.  People  had  seen  the  Hanging  Gardens  of  Babylon  and 
kissed  the  Pope's  toe;  but  they  had  never  seen  anything  like  this. 

24 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

A  nasal,  hawk-nosed  individual  in  eye-glasses  voiced  the  senti 
ments  of  all:  "If  that's  your  Southern  chivalry,  Warlow,  the  less 
I  see  of  it  the  better." 

Another  spoke  more  sympathetically,  yet  with  unchanged 
point:  "Poor  Dalhousie  —  born  to  trouble!  Rye  whiskey  an' 
marryin'  cousins  —  that's  what's  killed  him." 

A  third,  an  elderly  woman,  with  a  rich  voice,  said:  "I  wonder 
what  there  was  between  those  two.  ..." 

The  actual  rescue  proved  a  tame  affair.  Suddenly  attention 
was  diverted  from  it  by  the  cry  of  a  certain  winsome  young 
thing,  who,  when  the  alarm  was  raised,  had  been  among  the 
first  to  scream. 

"Oh,  look  at  that  little  man.  He  hit  him!" 

"Where?  — Who?  — Oh!" 

"Serves  him  ri—  Ah-h!" 

It  proved  as  the  screamer  said.  The  smallest  rickey-drinker, 
not  content  with  sounding  the  alarm,  had  gone  brilliantly  bolting 
down  the  beach.  Taking  his  stand  there  at  a  given  point,  he  had 
flung  himself  upon  the  youth  who  had  so  ably  saved  his  own  skin, 
as  the  latter  waded  ashore,  and  struck  him  savagely  in  the  face. 
It  was  observed  that  the  man  from  the  sea  seemed  surprised  by 
this  attack.  He  stared  at  his  small  assailant  in  a  confused  sort  of 
way;  and  then  with  passionate  swiftness  plucked  hold  of  him  by 
two  favorite  points  of  vantage,  and  threw  him  bodily  into  the 
water.  This  movement,  as  it  chanced,  turned  his  gaze  seaward. 
The  youth  was  seen  to  stand  an  instant,  rigid  as  a  bather  in 
marble,  staring  out  over  the  water  he  had  traversed  .  .  . 

Then  he  turned,  heedless  of  the  brandishings  of  the  little  man 
behind  him,  and  went  away  toward  his  bath-house  in  the  manner 
that  is  best  described  as  a  slink. 


Ill 


How  Carlisle  screamed  when  the  Boat  upset,  or  else  did  n't,  as  the 
Case  might  be;  also  of  Mrs.  Heth,  who  went  down  Six  Floors  to 
nail  Falsehoods,  etc. 

MISS  CARLISLE  HETH  sat  cold  and  proud  in  the  ap 
proaching  lifeboat,  picking  at  her  sopping  skirts.  She 
ignored,  hardly  hearing,  the  conversation  of  her  rescuer, 
hinting  broadly  that  she  should  reveal  these  mysteries  to  him. 
Revelation,  as  she  understood  herself,  was  the  contrary  of  her  de 
sire.  The  occurrences  of  the  last  quarter  of  an  hour  had  actually 
dazed  her;  but  the  net  result  of  them  was  sufficiently  manifest. 
Her  purpose  had  been  to  detach  herself  unnoticed  from  Dal- 
housie's  gay  fame.  And  now:  —  Look  at  the  boat  pavilion  .  .  . 

It  was  the  bitterest  moment  of  Miss  Heth's  well-sheltered 
young  life.  Of  notoriety,  of  a  vulgar  sensation  such  as  this,  of  ma 
licious  gossip,  of  all  that  was  cheap  and  familiarizing,  she  had  a 
deep-seated  horror.  Of  the  moment  of  reckoning  with  her  mother, 
whose  objections  to  noisy  rumor  rather  surpassed  her  own,  she 
felt  a  wholesome  dread.  There  was  also  the  matter  of  her  per 
sonal  appearance,  which  she  conceived  to  be  repulsive:  she  was 
confident  that  she  looked  a  hideosity  and  a  sight.  Her  eyes  fas 
tened  from  afar  upon  the  staring  faces  on  the  pavilion.  She  saw 
hungry  curiosity  stalking  there,  naked  and  unashamed,  and  the 
sight  sickened  her. 

For  these  faces,  as  individual  faces,  she  felt  indifference  and 
contempt.  But  in  the  mass  they  seemed  to  assume  the  enormous 
importance  of  good  or  ill  repute.  What  these  people  were  saying 
of  her  and  Dalhousie  to-day,  the  world  would  say  to-morrow. 

To  know  what  this  was,  she  would  have  given  on  the  spot  all 
the  money  she  possessed  (eight  thousand  dollars,  birthday  and 
Christmas  presents,  in  United  States  bonds).  But  to  run  the 

26 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

gauntlet  of  those  questioning  faces  was  just  a  little  more  than  she 
could  endure.  She  was  quick  in  action.  She  said: 

"Land  me  here,  Mr.  Wedge.  And  you  must  walk  with  me  to 
the  hotel." 

As  she  directed,  so  it  was  done.  They  landed  there,  and  Car 
lisle  and  Mr.  Wedge  struck  out  hurriedly  up  the  strand  for  the 
main  entrance  of  the  hostelry.  When  the  cunning  ruse  became 
plain  to  the  staring  gallery,  it  was  practically  too  late  to  do  any 
thing  about  it.  You  could  not  have  caught  the  escaping  pair 
without  a  sprint.  However,  each  man  promised  himself  to  be  the 
first  to  interview  the  boatman  .  .  . 

After  the  humiliating  cut-and-run,  which  stretched  out  in 
terminably,  Carlisle  found  herself,  at  length,  in  the  haven  of  the 
brilliantly  lighted  elevator.  Water  dribbled  from  her  skirt's  edge; 
she  was  aware  of  the  elevator  boy's  African  side-glances.  If  she 
had  been  a  different  sort  of  girl,  she  could  no  longer  have  re 
frained  from  bursting  into  tears.  Fine  ending  to  her  rosy  journey 
this!  —  a  sensational  "  scene  "  played  out  before  a  house  of  loaf 
ers,  and  now  the  babel  of  thousand-tongued  gossip,  linking  her 
name  amorously  (so  she  suspected)  with  the  red-painted  ne'er- 
do-well.  Charming  background,  indeed,  for  a  remeeting  with  the 
heir  of  the  Cannings. 

Her  plight  was  crushing  to  the  distracted  girl;  but  her  anger, 
the  wild  resentment  of  a  high  spirit  feeling  itself  abominably 
mistreated,  made  it  impossible  for  her  to  be  crushed.  She  would 
not  lie  down  tamely  and  be  trampled  upon  by  malicious  mis 
chance.  She  would  not  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth,  just  risen  from  her  refreshing  nap,  heard  the 
sounds  of  arrival  in  the  adjoining  room  and  opened  the  door  be 
tween.  Then  she  leaned  back  against  the  door-frame,  her  lady 
like  eyes  starting  from  her  head. 

"Carlisle!  .  .  .  Oh,  merciful  heavens!  What?  —  What  on 
earth's  happened?" 

Miss  Heth,  already  beginning  to  free  herself  of  her  soaking 
clothes,  braced  for  the  explanatory  ordeal.  Having  no  plan  of 
procedure  except  to  put  herself  in  as  praiseworthy  a  light  as  pos 
sible  (thus  avoiding  a  useless  scene) ,  she  began  in  a  hard,  dry  voice : 

27 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"I  went  out  for  a  little  sail.  I  thought  it  would  be  a  nice  thing 
to  do,  the  sea  was  so  smooth  and  calm.  A  —  a  man  was  out  swim 
ming  near  me,  and  he  climbed  into  my  boat.  I  ordered  him  out, 
and  —  and  he  jumped  out,  and  —  I  upset.  He  swam  off  — 
leaving  me  in  the  water  —  and  the  boatman  had  to  come  out  and 
bring  me  in.  Oh,  mamma!  —  I'm  the  talk  of  the  place!" 

Mrs.  Heth  took  two  swift  strides  into  the  room.  She  came  like 
a  cat,  claws  out,  ready  to  pounce.  Her  splendid  hair  hung  loose 
about  her  head,  revealing  the  birthmark  upon  the  temple,  a 
round  spot  the  size  of  a  silver  half-dollar.  Ordinarily  dull  pink, 
this  spot  was  slowly  mottling  in  blues  and  purples:  though  evi 
dently  not  with  reference  to  the  perils  of  the  deep,  so  narrowly 
escaped  by  her  only  child. 

"The  talk  of  the  place!  —  what  do  you  mean? "  she  asked  in  a 
voice  that  sounded  dangerous.  "A  man!  —  what  man?  Speak? 
What  right  did  he  have  to  get  into  your  boat?" 

"Of  course  he  had  no  right  to  get  into  my  boat,  mamma,"  said 
Carlisle,  dribbling  water.  "None  whatever.  That  is  what  I  told 
him,  from  the  beginning.  His  name  is  Dalhousie.  I  —  that  part 
makes  no  dif  — " 

"  Dalhousie !  Colonel  Dalhousie's  son !  —  that  young  sot !  Why, 
you  don't  know  him,  do  you?  —  you  never  met  him  in  your  life — " 

"Please  don't  storm  and  rant,  mamma.  It  only  makes  things 
worse.  As  I  was  saying,  when  you  interrupted,  I  —  I  met  this 
man  once  —  a  long  time  ago.  Some  one  introduced  him,  I  sup 
pose.  That  must  have  been  it.  I  —  I  've  never  seen  him  from 
that  time.  He  had  n't  the  faintest  right  to  get  into  my  boat  — 
not  the  faintest.  He—" 

"  But  what  did  he  do  it  for  ?  What  did  he  want?  What  was  his 
purpose,  I  say?" 

Carlisle  turned  away  with  a  wet  skirt  to  hang.  It  was  certainly 
very  difficult  to  explain  things  to  mamma. 

"  Oh,  mamma !  —  How  can  I  tell  you  why  he  wanted  to  get  into 
my  boat?  All  this  just  wastes  time.  Perhaps  he  thought  he  would 
have  a  little  flirtation.  Perhaps  he  wanted  to  rest  from  his  — " 

"  What  did  he  say  when  he  got  in?  He  did  n't  just  step  on  like 
you  were  a  street  car,  did  he?  Speak  up!  What  ex  — " 

28 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"That's  just  it!  That's  just  what  he  did.  He  climbed  in,  and 
did  n't  say  a  word.  I  at  once  told  him  to  get  out.  That  is  what 
we  talked  about  entirely.  Then  at  last  he  got  out,  in  —  in  an 
angry  way  —  shaking  the  boat,  and  then  I  —  I  went  over  — : 

"It  passes  belief!  The  young  ruffian,  after  upsetting  you, 
simply  deserted  —  Were  you  in  the  water  long?  Are  you  cold? 
Do  you  feel  like  you  were  going  to  have  chills?" 

"No  — I  feel  well  enough,  physically.  .  .  .  But  —  mamma  — 

"You're  going  to  have  chills  —  that's  it.  No  wonder!  Wait! 
I  never  in  my  life!  .  .  ." 

She  whisked  into  her  bedroom,  and,  returning  with  the  travel 
ling-bag,  produced  a  bijou  flask  with  a  silver  top  that  turned 
into  a  little  drinking-cup.  Into  the  top  she  swiftly  poured  a 
thimbleful  of  excellent  French  brandy. 

"Drink  this.  It  will  keep  them  off."  And  she  added:  "It 
passes  belief.  ..." 

And  then  she  walked  the  floor,  her  unexpected  hands,  so  oddly 
stubbed  and  thick,  clasped  before  her. 

"You  called  out  to  him,  of  course?  You  screamed  for  his 
assistance?" 

Carlisle,  choking  over  the  inflammatory  draught,  set  the  silver 
top  down  on  the  bureau.  There  was  a  gratifying  absence  of 
cynicism  in  her  manner.  She  was  always,  as  her  mother  knew,  a 
serious  girl  at  heart.  She  had  to  drink  nearly  half  a  glass  of  water 
before  she  could  dislodge  all  the  brandy  from  her  larynx. 

"Oh,  mamma  —  how  can  I  remember  just  exactly  what  I  did? 
Please  be  reasonable.  I  was  too  excited  and  frightened,  suddenly 
plunged  into  the  water,  to  think  what  I  was  doing.  The  point  — ' ' 

"You  must  have  cried  out.  Of  course  you  screamed  for  his 
assistance.  And  the  young  blaggard  .  .  .  What  time  is  it?  Five 
o'clock?  Then  Willie's  train  is  already  in  .  .  ." 

The  spoken  thought  brought  a  full  stop  to  the  good  lady's 
ejaculations,  shot  her  mind  in  dead  silence  round  a  corner.  She 
stopped  walking,  stood  intently  still.  After  all,  what  so  serious 
had  happened?  Her  daughter  was,  indeed,  the  talk  of  the  place, 
which  was  an  exceedingly  undesirable  thing;  especially  since  an 
"exclusive"  girl's  name  is  so  tender  a  bloom,  and  Mr.  Canning 

29 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

was  very  probably  downstairs  listening  to  it  now  —  the  talk, 
that  is.  But,  after  all,  young  Dalhousie's  dissolute  misbehaviors 
were  so  well  known,  nobody  could  possibly  .  .  . 

"They  can  hardly  say  anything  to  reflect  upon  you,"  the 
mother  summed  up  aloud,  frowning  intently.  "You  have  been 
foolish,  most  indiscreet.  How  you  ever  permitted  anybody  to 
introduce  such  a  character  to  you  passes  my  understanding. 
However  —  any  attractive  girl  is  likely  to  draw  the  attacks  of 
ruffianly  men.  His  conduct  surpass  — " 

"Yes  —  but  do  you  think  everybody '11  understand  that?" 
said  Carlisle,  hurriedly,  and  rather  felt  that  the  worst  was  over. 
"That's  just  it,  mamma,  —  don't  you  see?  How  do  we  know 
what  sort  of  gossip  is  being  bandied  about  downstairs  now?  You 
know  people  always  put  the  worst  possible  construction  they  can 
on  a  —  an  episode  like  this!  ..." 

Her  mother  wheeled  on  her,  struck  afresh  in  her  dearest  posses 
sion,  namely:  her  pride  in  the  prestige  of  the  name  of  Heth  in  an 
envious  and  backbiting  world. 

"How  do  you  mean,  construction?  What  construction  could 
they  possibly — " 

"Why,  anything,  mamma!  —  anything  their  horrid  minds  can 
think  of.  That  I'm  a  great  friend  of  this  charming  man's,  for  in 
stance,  —  engaged  to  him,  perhaps!  That  this  exhibition  in  the 
boat  was  only  a  refined  little  lovers'  quarrel  — " 

"How  under  heaven  could  any  fool  say  — " 

"Well,  you  know  they'll  wonder  why  he  got  into  the  boat  in 
the  first  place,  and  say  the  hatef  ullest  thing  they  can  think  of  ... 
There  are  plenty  of  people  who  would  like  to  see  us  h-humiliated." 

Mrs.  Heth,  staring  at  her  with  an  intake  of  the  breath,  then 
said  slowly:  "Ah— hi"  And  she  took  in  a  whole  range  of  new 
possibilities  with  one  leap  of  her  immensely  constructive  mind. 

"It  is  n't  fair,"  said  Carlisle,  nervously,  slipping  into  a  pretty 
pink  negligee.  "And  you  know  how  a  gossipy  story  flies,  grow 
ing  all  the  time  — " 

"I  know,"  murmured  her  mother,  intensely,  as  one  who  has 
suffered  much  from  just  that  demeanor  of  stories.  .  .  . 

The  falling  sun  shot  a  ray  into  the  white-and-cherry  bedroom; 

30 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

peeped  at  the  lovely  girl  sitting  stiffly  on  the  bed's  edge,  turned 
thick  mote-beams  upon  the  lady  of  deceptive  delicacy  who 
stood,  with  flowing  brown  hair  and  still  more  flowing  robe  de 
chambre,  silent  upon  her  peak  in  Darien.  The  leather-shod 
clocklet,  which  always  accompanied  these  two  upon  their  travels 
could  now  be  heard  ticking.  Carlisle  looked  at  her  mother,  and 
there  were  both  apprehensiveness  and  dependence  in  her  look. 
She  herself  was  the  cleverer  of  the  two  women,  but  very  com 
forting  it  was  to  her  to  feel  this  rock-like  support  behind  her  now. 

Into  Mrs.  Heth's  gray  eyes  had  sprung  a  kind  of  glitter,  the 
look  of  a  commanding  general  about  to  make  an  exterminative 
rush  upon  the  enemy.  Hugo  Canning  to  be  maliciously  informed 
that  her  daughter  was,  had  been,  or  ever  should  be  engaged  to 
Jack  Dalhousie!  Not  while  she  retained  her  love  of  justice,  and 
the  power  of  locomotion  in  her  limbs. 

"Oho!"  said  she.  "Well,  I'll  fix  that ...  I'll  stamp  upon  their 
miserable  lies  ..." 

The  room  telephone  rang  loudly,  hastening  decisions.  Carlisle 
winced  visibly.  In  her  mood  of  acute  sensitiveness,  she  was  for 
not  answering  at  all.  But  Mrs.  Heth,  the  fighting  man  now  in 
full  possession  of  her,  tossed  off  the  receiver  with  a  brigadier  air. 

"Well?"  demanded  she  sharply;  and  then,  continuing:  "Yes. 
Oh,  yes!  Howdedo,  Willie  .  .  .  You've  arrived,  have  you?  (It's 
Willie  Kerr,  Cally.)  What?  Oh,  yes.  She's  quite  well,  though 
naturally  somewhat  upset  by  the  shock.  It  is  a  most  unpleasant 
occurrence,  and  I  feel  deeply  for  the  young  man's  father,  and  his 
friends  if  he  has  any.  Certainly,  Willie.  We  want  the  whole  af 
fair  perfectly  understood.  Our  position  demands  it.  Yes.  I  want 
to  talk  with  you  about  it,  at  once.  Will  you  meet  me  in  the  Blue 
Parlor  in  ten  minutes?  Very  well.  Mr.  Canning  came  with  you,  I 
suppose?  .  .  .  Ah,  yes  .  .  .  What?  No,  Willie!  Not  a  line  I  You 
must  put  your  foot  down  on  that!  This  is  entirely  a  personal 
matter  and  I  will  not  allow  a  piece  in  the  paper  about  it.  I  won't 
have  it.  ...  Ah.  All  right,  then.  I  '11  trust  that  to  you.  In  ten 
minutes,  Willie.  ..." 

The  capable  little  general  turned  from  the  telephone  to  find  the 
eyes  of  the  lieutenant  or  private  fixed  fearfully  upon  her. 


V.    V.  Js     Eyes 

"Willie,"  she  explained,  hurriedly,  "says  there's  a  newspaper 
reporter  hanging  about  —  think  of  it!  —  trying  to  pick  up  some 
thing  scandalous  for  his  wretched  sheet.  Willie  has  promised  to 
attend  to  him.  He  says  he  knows  the  editor  or  correspondent  or 
whoever  it  is,  and  there  won't  be  the  slightest  trouble  in  shutting 
him  up.  There  shan't  be  either.  Now  to  business." 

At  her  best  in  action,  mamma  glided  through  the  door  into  her 
own  room,  slipping  off  her  robe  as  she  glided.  In  an  amazingly 
short  time  she  was  back  again,  breathing  hard,  and  dressed  for 
no-quarter  affray. 

"You  did  n't  talk  downstairs,  Cally?  No  one  pumped  you  as 
to  what  had  happened?" 

"No,  I  spoke  to  no  one." 

Mrs.  Heth  wielded  hatpins  before  the  mirror,  the  glitter 
surviving  in  her  eyes. 

"I  am  putting  on  a  hat,"  she  threw  out,  "to  give  matters  a 
casual  air.  A  public  hotel's  a  hotbed  of  gossip.  Everything  de 
pends  on  the  story's  being  started  right — on  just  the  right 
note.  .  .  .  Thank  God,  I'm  here!" 

"Lie  down,"  added  Mrs.  Heth,  and  Carlisle  lay  down. 

The  most  exhaustive  details  of  the  affair  had  not,  perhaps, 
been  laboriously  collected  as  yet,  but  luckily  Mrs.  Heth  was  not 
the  sort  that  requires  a  mass  of  verbose  testimony  and  dull  sta 
tistics.  The  right  note  awaited  her  touch  six  floors  below,  and 
time  was  pressing.  Already  her  mind  had  flown  well  ahead,  per 
ceived  with  precision  just  what  was  required.  Willie  must  be 
seen,  and  at  least  two  ladies,  of  different  sets,  great  gossips,  for 
preference;  and  to  these  she  would  confide,  with  some  little  just 
indignation  but  without  excitement,  the  astounding  truth  about 
the  young  blackleg  who,  having  boarded  and  upset  her  daugh 
ter's  boat,  turned  coward  and  scuttled  off,  ignoring  her  fright 
ened  cries.  Nor  would  she  fail  to  express  her  sincere  sympathy 
for  Colonel  Dalhousie,  whose  heart  (she  understood)  the  be 
havior  of  his  degenerate  son  had  broken  before  now.  .  .  . 

"Do  you  want  Flora  with  you?" 

"No  —  I'd  rather  be  alone." 

"Remain  quietly  here  till  I  return." 

32 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Briefly  framed  in  the  doorway,  Mrs.  Heth  added:  "You  must 
get  some  sleep  to  be  fresh  for  the  evening  .  .  .  I'll  nail  their  slan 
derous  falsehoods." 

Her  daughter's  glance  upon  her  was  touched  with  a  flash  of 
admiration,  the  more  striking  in  that  she  herself  was  quite  un 
conscious  of  it. 

Exact  definition  of  desire  and  a  simple  strength  of  purpose 
from  which  all  aims  of  others  bound  back  stone-dead:  what  bril 
liance  of  genius  or  quintessence  of  mother- wit  can  hope  to  outdo 
this  immortal  combination? 

Echo,  solitary,  answers  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth's  return  to  the  upper  regions,  an  hour  later,  trum 
peted  complete  victory.  The  right  note  was  struck;  all  was  set 
tled.  Carlisle,  it  appeared,  had  trusted  insufficiently  to  the 
virtue  of  the  Heth  name.  Of  horrid  gossip  there  had  been,  at  the 
worst,  no  more  than  a  bare  hint  or  two,  an  attenuated  suggestion. 
Malicious  as  the  world  was,  few,  indeed,  had  dreamed  any  justifi 
cation  of  Dalhousie's  blackguardism.  Already,  it  appeared,  the 
hotel  rang  with  objurgations  of  it,  and  him.  Still,  Mrs.  Heth 
had  struck  the  note,  and  struck  hard. 

Carlisle  was  bidden  to  sleep,  after  her  trying  experiences,  to 
regain  her  poise  and  color  for  the  evening.  .  .  . 

Alone  again  in  the  twilight  bedroom,  the  girl  snuggled  beneath 
a  pretty  pale-blue  quilt,  and  absently  scrutinized  her  pink  and 
very  shiny  little  finger  nails.  After  the  excitement  and  strain  of 
the  last  hour  and  a  half,  she  felt  that  she  was  now  at  peace.  No 
thing  at  all  was  going  to  happen.  Nobody  could  say  anything  the 
least  bit  horrid  about  her,  the  least  bit  injurious  to  her  position. 
She  stood  exactly  where  she  had  stood  when  she  went  out  for  the 
sail.  She  was  not  even  going  to  have  chills  .  .  . 

She  decided  to  dismiss  it  all  from  her  mind  and  go  to  sleep,  but 
her  mind  for  a  time  refused  to  come  into  this  agreement.  Though 
that  was  exactly  what  she  had  meant  not  to  do,  the  girl  pre 
sently  found  herself  thinking  back  over  the  whole  occurrence, 
from  the  moment  when  she  first  saw  Dalhousie  in  the  water.  In 
time  vague  doubts  gathered  and  clouded  her  perfect  brow.  She 

33 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


became  a  little  oppressed  by  the  recollection  of  certain  variations 
between  what  she  had  said  and  really  intended  to  say  to  her 
mother  upstairs,  and  what  her  mother  appeared  to  have  said  to 
Rumor  downstairs.  For  instance,  she  had  never  said  that  Dal- 
housie  literally  upset  her  boat,  or  even  that  he  was  exactly  in  the 
boat  when  it  upset;  and  never  said  that  she  had  screamed  again 
and  again  for  his  help  when  she  found  herself  in  the  water.  No, 
she  had  particularly  avoided  saying  those  things,  for  justly  angry 
and  excited  though  she  was,  she  had  n't  considered  it  right  to  say 
anything  that  was  n't  strictly  true.  Mamma  just  jumped  right 
on  ahead,  though,  paying  no  attention  to  what  you  said. 

The  whole  thing  had  happened  very  unfortunately,  she  saw 
that  clearly  now.  Of  course,  she  could  n't  tell  mamma  that  she 
and  Jack  Dalhousie  had  quarrelled  terribly  in  the  boat  and  he 
had  looked  as  if  he  meant  to  strike  her,  for  then  mamma  would 
have  asked,  How  could  you  have  had  such  a  terrible  quarrel  with 
a  man  that  somebody  barely  introduced  to  you  once,  a  long  time 
ago?  And  if  she  had  said  pointblank,  No,  I  don't  think  I 
screamed,  mamma  would  have  asked,  Why  under  heaven  did  n't 
you  scream?  —  and  all  this  would  have  meant  stopping  for  a  long 
explanation  right  there,  just  when  there  was  so  much  else  to 
think  about,  and  mamma  almost  bursting  a  blood-vessel  as  it  was. 

Still,  she  wished  now  that  it  had  all  been  started  differently. 
In  the  excitement,  of  course,  she  had  not  had  time  to  think  out 
every  single  thing  carefully  and  definitely.  It  occurred  to  her 
now,  after  some  meditation,  that  she  might  simply  have  said  to 
mamma:  "He  had  frightened  me  so  by  getting  into  my  boat,  that 
when  I  upset  and  I  knew  I  was  n't  going  to  drown,  I  did  n't  want 
to  call  him  back"  .  .  . 

Darkness  crept  into  the  white-and-cherry  bedroom.  Till  now, 
what  with  nearly  drowning  and  mamma  and  everything,  she  had 
really  thought  very  little  about  it  from  Dalhousie's  point  of  view. 
Now  it  came  over  her,  rather  dubiously,  that  what  everybody 
seemed  to  be  saying  of  him  downstairs  did  put  him  in  quite  a  dis 
agreeable  position.  But  then,  of  course,  everybody  was  a  little 
worked  up  and  excited  just  now.  In  a  day  or  two  they  would  for 
get  about  it,  and  the  whole  thing  would  blow  over.  Besides,  he 

34 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

deserved  the  severest  punishment  for  the  way  he  had  treated  her; 
and  as  for  anything  he  might  say  now  (though  as  a  gentleman  he 
would  hardly  say  anything  and  try  to  blacken  a  lady's  character), 
of  course  nobody  would  listen  to  him  for  a  minute. 

And  as  far  as  that  went,  nobody  would  listen  to  her  either. 
People  never  did.  She  regretted  the  whole  occurrence  as  much  as 
any  one,  but  you  could  never  correct  flying  gossip;  everybody 
knows  that.  People  always  arrange  the  little  details  as  they  want 
them  arranged,  according  to  what  makes  the  most  exciting 
story,  and  they  never  pay  the  smallest  attention  when  you  come 
in  with  a  just,  mathematical  face  and  say:  "You  have  n't  got  it 
quite  right  there.  There's  a  little  mistake  here.  .  .  ." 

Worry,  clearly,  was  out  of  place.  It  never  does  any  good,  as  all 
philosophers  agree;  and  besides,  it  brings  wrinkles  in  or  near  the 
forehead.  Carlisle  turned  on  her  other  side  and  snuggled  with 
more  relaxation  beneath  the  pale-blue  quilt.  Drowsiness  stole 
over  her,  seducing  thought.  Presently  she  slept,  and  dreamed  of 
Mr.  Canning. 


TV 


Mr.  Hugo  Canning,  of  the  well-known  Pursuing-Sex;  how  the 
Great  Young  Man  pursued  Miss  Heth  to  a  Summer-house,  and 
what  stopped  his  Thundering  Feet. 

NOR  were  the  figments  of  sweet  sleep  too  fanciful  or  far- 
flown.    About  eight-thirty  o'clock,  when  Mrs.  and  Miss 
Heth  stepped  from  a  descending  lift  into  the  glaring  pub 
licity  of  the  main  floor,  the  first  object  that  their  eyes  fell  upon 
was  Mr.  Hugo  Canning  in  the  flesh.    The  second  was  Cousin 
Willie  Kerr,  even  more  in  the  flesh,  trotting  loyally  at  his  side. 
At  this  precise  instant,  in  short,  the  celebrated  transient  quitted 
the  dining-room  for  the  relaxations  of  his  evening. 

The  coincidence  of  the  moment  was  pure:  one  hundred  per 
cent,  as  they  say  commercially.  One  takes  it  to  mean  that 
Destiny,  having  handled  a  favorite  child  somewhat  roughly  for 
a  time,  now  turned  back  its  smiling  mother-face.  The  ladies 
Heth,  having  dined  refinedly  in  their  sitting-room,  descended  in 
search  of  cooling  breezes,  or  for  any  other  reason  why.  Over  the 
spaces  of  the  great  court,  half  lobby,  half  parlor,  Miss  Heth  had 
seen  the  masculine  apparitions  an  instant  before  they  saw  her: 
or  just  in  time,  that  is  to  say,  to  be  showing  them  now  her  flaw 
less  profile.  .  .  . 

It  is  easily  surmised  that  Miss  Heth's  manner  in  action  was 
contained,  her  habit  the  very  reverse  of  forward.  One  seeing  her 
now  would  be  cheaply  cynical,  indeed,  to  say  or  dream  that,  with 
reference  to  some  such  conjuncture  as  the  present,  this  girl  had 
left  a  happy  home  many  hours  before.  Her  presence  shamed 
every  unworthy  surmise.  With  a  lovely  unconsciousness  she 
was  spied  walking  her  innocent  ways  toward  the  piazza  with 
mamma,  even  now  girlishly  unaware  that  an  opposite  and  up 
roarious  sex  was  in  headlong  pursuit  .  .  . 

36 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

If  this  pursuit  —  to  be  doggedly  literal  —  appeared  to  lag  for  a 
moment,  if  it  did  not  seem  to  start  with  that  instant  elan  which 
one  had  a  right  to  expect,  be  sure  that  there  was  a  complication 
of  sound  reasons  for  that.  Kerr,  in  the  circumstances,  was  the 
appointed  leader  of  the  chase;  and  Kerr  hesitated.  Canning's 
desire  to  avoid  the  local  society  and  be  left  free  to  outdoor 
exercise  and  sleep  was,  in  truth,  only  too  well  known  to  him.  And 
to-night,  worse  luck,  the  distinguished  visitor  appeared  even  less 
socially  inclined  than  usual :  annoyed  when  the  select  little  party 
he  had  expected  from  northerly  haunts  had  been  found  repre 
sented  at  the  Beach  by  a  telegram  instead;  increasingly  bored  by 
the  desolate  air  of  the  all  but  empty  hostelry.  "  When 's  the 
next  train  out  of  this  hell-hole? "  —  such  was  Mr.  Canning's 
last  recorded  remark  up  to  this  not  uninteresting  moment. 

Kerr,  when  he  saw  Mrs.  and  Miss  Heth  over  the  distance, 
merely  made  a  genial  exclamation,  and  then  gazed.  He  was 
nearing  forty,  was  Willie,  short  and  slightly  bald,  with  an  in 
creasing  appreciation  of  the  world's  good  things  and  as  much 
good  nature  as  his  round  figure  called  for.  Canning's  acquaint 
ance  he  had  by  the  chance  of  a  lifelong  friendship  with  Mrs.  Alli 
son  Payne.  By  reason  of  a  native  clannishness  and  certain  small 
obligations  of  a  more  material  nature,  he  was  more  than  ready 
to  share  his  privileges  with  his  brilliant  cousins.  But  ... 

"So  that's  the  drowned  lady,"  said  Canning's  voice,  rather 
moodily,  at  his  elbow.  .  .  .  "Well,  then,  I  know  her." 

"Dandy  girl,  Carlisle,"  exclaimed  Willie,  instantly.  "Great 
little  piece  of  work  ..." 

One  hundred  feet  away,  opportunity  unconsciously  receded 
toward  the  piazza,.  Willie,  having  hesitated  through  no  unfaith 
fulness,  plunged  with  no  want  of  tact. 

"  Got  to  speak  to  'em  a  minute  —  make  inquiries  —  cousins, 
y'  know.  D'  ye  mind?" 

"My  dear  chap,  why  should  I?" 

"Awright  —  just  stop  and  say  howdedo,"  said  the  plump 
diplomatist.  "Won't  take  a  minute  .  .  ." 

And  Canning,  perceiving  then  that  Kerr  expected  to  make  this 
stop  in  his  company,  said  with  an  assurance  not  unbecoming  to 

37 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


his  lordly  bearing:  "If  you  please.  And  don't  start  anything,  for 
pity's  sake.  I'm  for  bed  in  fifteen  minutes." 

So  it  all  fell  out,  according  to  the  book.  So  it  was  that  the 
pursuing  feet  were  free  to  thunder.  So  Mrs.  Heth  heard  the  voice 
of  the  leal  one,  subdued  from  a  distance:  "Howdedo,  Cousin 
Isabel!  How  're  you  an'  Carlisle  this  evening?  ..." 

And  so  the  maid  turned,  startled  from  her  other-worldly 
dreams  .  .  . 

He  was  the  greatest  parti  that  had  ever  crossed  her  path,  that 
was  ever  likely  to  cross  her  path.  But  Miss  Heth  faced  him  with 
no  want  of  confidence;  received  his  greeting  with  a  charming 
bright  negligence.  One  saw  readily  that  such  a  matter  as  "mak 
ing  an  impression"  was  far  indeed  from  this  maid's  mind.  If 
doubts,  a  vague  uneasiness  relative  to  the  afternoon,  still  fretted 
the  hinterlands  of  her  mind  (and  they  did),  she  was  much  too 
well  trained,  too  resolute  withal,  to  let  them  appear  troub- 
lously  upon  the  surface.  Moreover,  the  nap  of  forty  minutes, 
not  winks,  had  been  like  the  turning  of  a  new  leaf;  and  she  was 
fortified,  woman-wise,  with  the  knowledge  that  she  looked  her 
best.  Over  her  shoulders  there  clung  a  shimmering  scarf,  a  pretty 
trifle  all  made  of  the  scales  of  a  silver  mermaid.  It  was  observed, 
however,  that  the  gray  crepe-de-chine  quite  justified  its 
choice.  .  .  . 

The  meeting  of  four  had  been  effected  in  one  end  of  the  wide 
garish  space:  among  the  loungers  of  the  lobby,  all  eyes  were 
turned  in  that  direction.  There  were  salutations;  the  introduc 
tion  of  Mr.  Canning  to  Mrs.  Heth;  inquiries  after  Miss  Heth's 
health.  Quite  easily  the  square  party  resolved  itself  into  two 
conversational  halves.  Mrs.  Heth,  it  was  clear  from  the  outset, 
preferred  Willie  Kerr's  talk  above  any  other  obtainable  at  that 
time  and  place.  She  was,  and  remained,  absolutely  fascinated 
by  it  ... 

"It  seems  quite  unnecessary,"  Mr.  Canning  was  saying  —  but 
he  pronounced  it  "unne's'ry"  —  "to  ask  if  you  are  any  the 
worse  for  the  ducking  ..." 

"  Oh,  no  —  I  'm  quite  well,  thank  you.  We  've  suffered  nothing 
worse  than  the  spoiling  of  all  our  plans  in  coming  here! " 

38 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


The  man's  look  politely  interrogated  her.  "Oh,  really?  I'm 
sorry." 

"We  came,  you  see,  to  be  very  quiet.  And  we  were  never  so 
frightfully  noisy  in  our  lives." 

He  smiled;  made  his  small  distinguished  bow. 

"You've  reason  to  feel  annoyed  on  all  scores  then.  At  any 
rate,  it's  charming  to  find  you  as  our  fellow  guest." 

And  his  eyes  flitted  from  her  toward  Kerr,  and  then  turned 
briefly  upon  mamma,  and  her  strange  little  downy  mustache. 

Carlisle  now  perceived  the  disinterestedness,  if  not  the  faint 
weariness,  in  Mr.  Canning's  manner;  she  saw  that  he  had  for 
gotten  the  five  minutes  at  the  Country  Club.  The  strong  proba 
bility  was,  moreover,  that  he  thought  the  worse  of  her  for  allow 
ing  herself  to  be  nearly  drowned  in  so  vulgarly  public  a  way. 
However,  she  was  untroubled;  she  thought  him,  for  her  part, 
adorable  to  look  at  and  of  a  splendid  manner  and  conceit;  and 
aloud  she  inquired,  with  her  air  of  shining  indifference,  if  Mr. 
Canning  was  not  delighted  with  the  Beach  in  October. 

"Well,  you  know,  I  think  I've  been  here  before"  —  he  said 
bean,  most  deliciously  —  "only  I  can't  be  quite  sure.  It  seems  to 
me  a  most  agreeable  place.  Only,  if  it  is  n't  indiscreet  to  inquire, 
what  does  one  do  in  the  evening?  " 

"Usually,  I  believe,  one  goes  to  bed  directly  after  dinner.  If 
one  does  this,  and  dines  extremely  late,  the  evening  slips  by 
quite  nicely,  we  find." 

"  But  the  afternoons?  Would  n't  they  perhaps  loom  a  thought 
long  at  times,  waiting  on  for  dinner?  " 

"There's  napping  provided  for  the  afternoon,  you  see.  And 
many  other  diversions,  such  as  reading,  walking,  and  think 
ing." 

"Perhaps  one  should  arrange  to  spend  only  afternoons  at  the 
Beach.  You  make  them  sound  simply  uproarious." 

"We're  a  simple  people  here,  Mr.  Canning,  with  simple  joys 
and  sorrows,  easily  amused." 

Mr.  Canning  looked  down  at  her.  However,  Carlisle  did  not 
meet  his  gaze.  Having  already,  in  a  quiet  way,  given  him  two 
looks  where  they  would  do  the  most  good,  she  was  now  glancing 

39 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

maidenly  at  mamma,  who  conversed  vice-presidentially  of  her 
Associated  Charities  policies. 

"They  must  be  brought  to  help  themselves!"  Mrs.  Heth  was 
saying.  "Wholesale,  thoughtless  generosity  is  demoralizing  to 
poverty.  It  is  sheer  ruination  to  their  moral  fibre." 

"Promiscuous  charity!  —  ruination!  Just  what  I  always 
say,"  chirped  Willie.  "Look at  ancient  Rome,  ma'am.  Began 
giving  away  corn  to  the  poor,  and,  by  gad!  —  she  fell!"  .  .  . 

"Delightful  !  I  see  I  shall  like  it  here,"  Mr.  Canning  was 
observing  —  and  was  there  perceptible  the  slightest  thawing  in 
his  somewhat  formidable  manner?  ...  "I  too,"  said  he,  "have 
dwelt  in  Arcady." 

The  girl  looked  over  the  spaces,  a  little  smile  in  her  eyes. 

"Ah,  then  you  did  n't  need  to  be  told  that  the  sandman  comes 
early  there." 

"But  not,  I  think,  when  the  moon  shines  bright  —  and  the 
simple  amusements  you  speak  of  seem  to  be  waiting?  Surely 
games  in  the  evening  are  not  altogether  forbidden,  or  does  my 
memory  of  the  place  deceive  me?" 

"You  seem  to  remember  it  perfectly.  But  I  thought  your 
complaint  was  that  there  was  nothing  at  all  amusing  to  do  in 
Arcady." 

"Ah,"  said  Mr.  Canning,  "but  I'm  having  my  second  thoughts 
now." 

She  had  given  him  a  third,  uptilting  look  with  her  speech;  and 
now  it  was  as  if  the  great  eligible  had  seen  her  for  the  first  time.  If 
the  gaze  of  his  handsome  eyes  became  somewhat  frank,  this  girl 
had  been  fashioned  to  stand  all  scrutiny  victoriously.  A  mode 
which  defined  the  figure  with  some  truthfulness  held  no  terrors  for 
her;  rather  the  contrary.  Her  skin  was  fine  and  fair  as  a  lily,  with 
an  undertone  of  warmth,  dawn  pink  on  the  cheek;  the  white 
ness  of  her  neck  showed  an  engaging  tracery  of  blue.  Her  mass 
of  hair,  of  an  ashy  dull  gold,  would  have  been  too  showy  above 
a  plain  face;  but  the  case  was  otherwise  with  her.  Her  mouth, 
which  was  not  quite  flawless  but  something  better,  in  especial 
allured  the  gaze;  so  did  her  eyes,  of  a  dusky  blue,  oddly  shaped, 
and  fringed  with  the  gayest  lashes  .  .  . 

40 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"Besides,"  added  the  man,  looking  down  at  her  with  a  certain 
lightening  in  his  gaze,  "as  I  remember,  I  did  not  say  that  there 
was  nothing  amusing  to  do.  I  merely,  as  a  stranger,  came  to  you 
begging  some  guidance  on  the  point." 

"I  see.  But  I  very  much  doubt  my  ability  to  guide  you  in  that 
way,  Mr.  Canning  — " 

"  I  can  only  observe  that  you've  thrown  out  a  number  of  per 
fectly  ripping  suggestions  already  —  walking  on  the  piazza,  for 
example.  Might  n't  we  steal  that  diversion  from  afternoon 
temporarily,  don't  you  think?  Perhaps  Mrs.  Heth  would  agree 
to  pursue  the  missing  breeze  so  far?" 

"That  would  be  nice,"  said  Carlisle. 

You  could  distinctly  hear  his  thundering  feet  now  .  .  . 

Strolling  for  four  was  agreed  upon,  and  that  simple  afternoon 
amusement  started.  But,  arriving  at  the  piazza,  the  dowager 
discovered  that,  after  all,  the  night  air  was  just  a  little  cool  for 
her,  and  turned  back,  not  without  some  beaming.  She  mentioned 
the  Blue  Parlor  as  her  port  of  call,  where  smoking  was  forbidden. 
Willie,  doing  his  duty  as  he  saw  it,  dropped  his  cigar  into  a  brass 
repository.  He  had  faults  like  the  rest  of  us,  had  Willie,  but  his 
deathless  loyalty  deserved  a  monument  in  a  park. 

Carlisle  and  Mr.  Canning  strolled  on  alone.  She  walked 
outwardly  serene  as  the  high-riding  moon,  but  inwardly  with  a 
quickening  sense  of  triumph,  hardly  clouded  at  all  now.  As  she 
and  mamma  had  planned  it,  so  it  had  fallen  out.  .  .  . 

Many  eyes  had  followed  this  shining  pair  as  they  quitted  the 
common  gathering-place.  She,  as  we  have  seen,  was  inviting  as 
a  spectacle.  He,  to  the  nobodies,  was  simply  one  of  the  sights  of 
the  place,  like  the  Fort.  And  his  distinguished  House  was  still 
a  small  one,  at  that,  not  yet  arrived  where  another  generation 
would  unfailingly  put  it.  If  the  grandfather  of  Hugo  Canning 
had  founded  the  family,  financially  speaking,  it  was  his  renowned 
father  who  had  raised  it  so  fast  and  far,  doubling  and  redoubling 
the  Canning  fortune  with  a  velocity  by  no  means  unprecedented 
in  the  eighties  and  nineties.  To-day  there  were  not  many  names 
better  known  in  the  world  of  affairs,  in  the  rarer  social  altitudes, 
even  in  the  shore-hotels  of  the  provinces.  .  .  . 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

And  the  son  and  heir  of  the  name  and  fortune,  who  now  trod 
the  Beach  piazza  with  Miss  Carlisle  Heth,  was  obviously  more 
than  many  sons  of  wealth,  much  more  than  a  mere  trousered 
incident  to  millions.  This  one  saw  in  the  first  glance  at  his 
Olympian  bearing;  but  Carlisle  Heth  knew  more  than  that. 
Upon  this  young  man  the  enterprising  vehicles  of  modern  his 
tory  had,  long  since,  conferred  an  individual  celebrity.  Often  had 
the  Sunday  editors  told  their  "public"  of  his  exploits  in  the 
sporting  and  social  realms,  as  they  called  them;  not  rarely  had 
journals  of  a  more  gossipy  character  paragraphed  him  smartly, 
using  their  asterisks  to  remove  all  doubt  as  to  who  was  meant. 
Before  such  an  evening  as  this  had  ever  crossed  her  maiden's 
dreams,  Carlisle  Heth  had  read  of  Hugo  Canning.  .  .  . 

It  was  a  bad  throat,  a  God-given  touch  of  bronchitis  or  what 
not,  that  had  sent  the  great  young  man  south.  This  was  known 
through  Willie  Kerr,  and  other  private  sources.  Also,  that  he 
would  remain  with  his  Payne  cousins  through  the  following  week; 
and  in  December  might  possibly  return  from  the  Carolinas  or 
Florida  for  a  few  days'  riding  with  the  Hunt  Club.  Meantime 
he  was  here:  and  it  was  but  Saturday,  mid-evening,  and  a  whole 
beautiful  Sunday  lay  ahead.  .  .  . 

From  the  piazza,,  after  a  turn  or  two,  Miss  Heth  and  Mr. 
Canning  sauntered  on  to  a  little  summer-house,  which  stood  on 
the  hotel  front-lawn,  not  far  from  the  piazza  end.  She  had 
hesitated  when  he  commended  the  pretty  bower;  but  it  was 
really  the  discreetest  spot  imaginable,  under  the  public  eye  in  all 
directions,  and  undoubtedly  commanding  a  perfect  view  of  the 
moonlight  on  the  water,  precisely  as  he  pointed  out. 

In  this  retreat, "  What  a  heavenly  night ! "  exclaimed  Miss  Heth. 

Canning,  still  standing,  looked  abroad  upon  a  scene  of  dim 
beauty,  gentle  airs,  and  faint  bright  light.  "  Now  that  you  say 
it,"  he  replied,  "it  is.  But  depend  on  it,  I  should  never  have 
admitted  it  quarter  of  an  hour  ago." 

"  Oh!  But  is  n't  it  rather  tedious  to  deny  what 's  so  beautifully 
plain?" 

"  Should  you  say  that  tedious  is  the  word  ?  A  better  man  than 
I  denied  his  Lord." 

42 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Yes,"  said  Carlisle,  not  absolutely  dead-sure  of  the  allusion, 
"but  he  was  frightened,  was  n't  he,  or  something?" 

"And  I  was  lonely.  Loneliness  beats  fear  hollow  for  making 
the  world  look  out  of  whack." 

"Doesn't  it?  And  is  there  a  lonesomer  place  on  the  globe 
than  a  summer  resort  out  of  season?" 

"But  we  were  speaking  of  fifteen  minutes  ago,  were  we  not?" 
said  Canning,  and  sat  down  beside  her  on  the  rustic  bench. 

The  walls  of  this  little  summer-house  were  largely  myth,  and 
lattice  for  the  rest.  Through  the  interstices  the  dim  brightness 
of  the  moon  misted  in,  and  the  multitudinous  rays  from  the 
hotel.  There  reached  them  the  murmur  of  voices,  the  languorous 
lap  of  water.  A  serene  and  reassuring  scene  it  surely  was;  there 
was  no  menace  in  the  night's  silvern  calmness,  no  shadow  of 
stalking  trouble.  .  .  . 

Carlisle  imagined  Mr.  Canning  to  be  capable  of  a  rapid  ad 
vance  at  his  desire,  and  was  opposed  on  principle  to  such  a 
course  of  events.  Still,  she  was  saying,  a  moment  or  two  later: 

"And  in  the  Payne  fort  on  the  Three  Winds  Road  —  1  sup 
pose  you  never  feel  lonely  there?" 

"Why  fort,  if  one  might  know?" 

"I've  been  told  that  you  were  awfully  well  barricaded  there, 
prepared  to  stand  any  sort  of  siege." 

Canning  seemed  quite  amused.  He  declared,  on  the  contrary, 
that  neglect  and  unpopularity  were  his  portion  in  a  strange  land. 

"I'm  an  invalid  on  sick-leave,"  said  he,  "and  my  orders  are 
to  go  to  bed.  Please  don't  smile,  for  it's  all  quite  true  .  .  ." 

He  appeared  to  develop  a  certain  interest  in  the  moonlit  talk. 
He  proceeded  in  a  voice  and  manner  no  longer  purely  civil : 

"And,  to  bare  my  soul  to  you,  I'm  no  fonder  of  being  lonely 
than  another  man.  ...  Do  you  know  that,  but  for  Kerr,  you're 
my  one  acquaintance  in  all  this  part  of  the  world?  What  shall 
we  say  of  that?  I  sit  at  dinner,  consumed  by  blue  devils.  I 
emerge,  and  behold,  you  walk  across  the  lobby.  Have  n't  I 
some  right  to  feel  that  the  gods  are  with  me  even  at  the  Beach?" 

Perchance  she  might  have  given  him  some  information  there, 
but  instead  she  laughed  musically. 

43 


V.    V.'s     Eye 


"The  god  of  the  pretty  speeches,  at  any  rate!  Must  I  tell  you 
that  you  did  n't  look  quite  overjoyed  when  dear  Willie  came 
dragging  you  up?" 

"I've  no  doubt  I  looked  all  sorts  of  ways,  for  I'd  never  felt 
more  unfit  for  any  society,  including  my  own.  The  more  is  my 
debt  to  you  for  chasing  my  devils  away.  .  .  .  But  perhaps  I  owe 
you  no  thanks  after  all,  as  one  guesses  that  you  do  these  little 
services  for  others  without  any  particular  effort." 

Carlisle  glanced  at  him,  smiling  a  little  from  her  dusky 
eyes. 

"Your  experience  is  that  most  people  find  it  a  great  effort  to 
speak  pleasantly  to  you,  I  suppose?  " 

"Again  I  point  out  to  you  that  our  talk  is  not  of  most  people, 
but  of  you." 

"Oh!  And  is  there  something  particularly  original  about  me? 
This  grows  exciting." 

"I,  for  one,  think  that  beauty  is  always  original,"  said  Can 
ning,  with  sufficient  impersonality,  but  no  more.  .  .  .  "Still,  we 
know,  of  course,  that  unaided  it  cannot  drive  the  blues  of  others 
very  far." 

"After  the  sugar-coating  comes  the  pill.  Tell  me  in  what  way 
I  have  been  deficient." 

"Ah,  that's  yet  to  learn.  To  be  charming  by  habit  is  an 
agreeable  thing;  but  you  have  n't  convinced  me  yet,  you  know, 
that  you  know  how  to  be  kind." 

Her  lashes  fell  before  his  masculine  gaze;  she  did  not  answer. 
About  them  was  the  sweet  hush  of  the  night.  She  was  aware  that 
he  had  moved  nearer  upon  their  bench;  aware,  too,  of  a  faster 
beating  of  her  heart.  And  then,  quite  suddenly,  a  new  voice 
spoke,  so  close  that  both  started  sharply;  a  rather  shy  voice, 
yet  one  possessed  of  a  certain  vivid  quality  of  life. 

"I  beg  your  pardon  — but  is  this  Miss  Heth?" 

They  turned  as  upon  one  string.  At  the  door  of  the  summer- 
house  stood  the  blurred  figure  of  a  man,  bareheaded  and  tall. 
The  light  being  chiefly  behind  him,  he  showed  only  in  thin  sil 
houette,  undistinguishable  as  to  age,  character,  and  personal  pul 
chritude.  Stares  passed  between  the  dim  trio. 

44 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"I  am  Miss  Heth." 

"  Could  you  possibly  let  me  speak  to  you  —  for  a  moment, 
Miss  Heth?  I  realize,  of  course,  that  it's  a  great  intrusion 
"but—" 

Canning  started  up,  annoyed.  Carlisle,  without  knowing  why, 
was  instantly  conscious  of  a  subtle  sinking  of  the  heart:  some 
deep  instinct  rang  a  warning  in  the  recesses  of  her  being,  as  if 
crying  out:  "This  man  means  trouble."  She  glanced  at  Mr. 
Canning  with  a  kind  of  little  shrug,  suggesting  doubt,  and  some 
helplessness;  and  he,  taking  this  for  sufficient  authority,  as 
sumed  forthwith  the  male's  protectorship. 

"Yes?  What  is  it  that  you  wish?" 

The  tall  stranger  was  observed  to  bow  slightly. 

"As  I  say,  I  beg  the  favor  of  speaking  to  Miss  Heth  a  few 
moments  —  privately.  Of  course  I  should  n't  venture  to  trespass 
so,  if  the  matter  were  n't  vitally  important  — " 

"Who  are  you?"  demanded  the  great  young  man  with  rather 
more  impatience  than  seemed  necessary.  "And  what  do  you 
wish  to  speak  to  her  about?  Speak  plainly,  I  beg,  and  be 
brief!" 

The  two  men  stood  facing  each  other  in  the  faint  light.  Ten 
feet  of  summer-house  floor  was  between  them,  yet  something  in 
their  position  was  indefinably  suggestive  of  a  conflict. 

"I  should  explain,"  said  the  intruder,  dim  in  the  doorway, 
"that  I  come  as  a  friend  of  poor  Dalhousie  —  the  boy  who  got 
into  all  the  trouble  ...  Ah  ..." 

The  involuntary  ejaculation,  briefly  arresting  his  speech,  was 
his  perfect  tribute  to  the  girl's  beauty  now  suddenly  revealed  to 
him.  For  Carlisle  had  unconsciously  leaned  forward  out  of  the 
shadows  of  the  bench  just  then,  a  cold  hand  laid  along  her 
heart. 

"This  afternoon,"  the  man  recovered,  with  a  somewhat  em 
barrassed  rush.  "I  —  I  appreciate,  I  need  n't  say,  that  it  seems 
a  great  liberty,  to  — " 

"Liberty  is  scarcely  the  word,"  said  Hugo  Canning,  fighting 
the  lady's  battle  with  lordly  assurance.  "Miss  Heth  declines 
to  hear  .  .  ." 

45 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

But  the  stranger's  vivid  voice  bore  him  down:  "Do  you,  Miss 
Heth  ?  .  .  .  The  situation  is  terribly  serious,  you  see.  I  don't 
want  to  alarm  you  unnecessarily,  but  —  I  —  I  'm  afraid  he  may 
take  matters  into  his  own  hands  — ' 

Canning  took  an  impatient  step  forward. 

"Nevertheless,  it's  pure  impudence  for  him  to  send  to  this 
lady,  sneaking  for  favors  now.  Let 's  — 

"Mr.  Canning,  I  —  I'm  afraid  I  ought  to  speak  to  him!" 

"  What  ?  "  said  Mr.  Canning,  wheeling  at  the  voice,  as  if  stung. 

"Oh/  .  .  .  That  'skindofyou!" 

Carlisle  felt,  under  Mr.  Canning's  incredulous  gaze,  that  this 
sudden  upwhirl  of  misfortune  was  the  further  refinement  of 
cruelty.  She  hardly  knew  what  to  do.  Scarcely  thinkable  as  it 
was  to  dismiss  Hugo  Canning  from  her  presence,  it  seemed  even 
more  impossible  to  pack  off  this  nameless  intruder.  Inconceiv 
able  malignity  of  chance,  indeed!  Only  one  doubt  of  its  all  being 
settled  and  blown  over  had  lingered  on  to  trouble  her;  and  now 
without  warning  this  doubt  rose  and  rushed  upon  her  in  the 
person  of  the  sudden  stranger  —  and  before  Mr.  Canning,  too. 
It  occurred  to  her,  with  ominous  sinkings  of  the  heart,  that  she 
had  relied  mistakenly  upon  Dalhousie's  gentlemanliness.  What 
horrid  intention  was  concealed  behind  these  strange  words  about 
his  taking  matters  into  his  own  hands?  And  suppose  she  refused 
to  see  the  emissary  alone,  and  he  then  said:  "Well,  then,  I'll 
just  have  to  speak  before  your  friend."  .  .  .  What  would  Mr. 
Canning  think  of  her  then?  What  was  he  going  to  think  of  her 
anyway? 

Carlisle,  having  risen,  answered  her  protector's  gaze  with  a 
look  of  appealing  sweetness,  and  said  in  a  low,  perturbed  voice: 

"I'm  so  dreadfully  sorry.  But  I  don't  quite  see  how  I  could 
refuse  just  to  —  to  hear  what  he  has  to  say.  Under  the  circum 
stances,  would  it  —  would  n't  it  be  simply  unkind?" 

Canning  said,  with  small  lightening  of  his  restrained  displeas 
ure:  "Ah!  I  'm  to  understand,  then,  that  you  wish  to  give  this  — 
gentleman  an  audience  alone?  " 

It  was,  of  course,  the  last  thing  on  earth  she  desired,  but  God 
clearly  was  out  of  his  heaven  to-day,  and  Mr.  Canning  would 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


like  her  better  in  the  long  run  if  he  stepped  aside  for  a  space  now. 
She  said,  with  a  restraint  which  did  her  credit: 

"  Could  you  forgive  me  —  for  five  minutes?  You  must  know 
how  I  — dislike  this.  But  ought  n't  I  —  " 

The  great  parti  gave  an  ironic  little  laugh. 

"As  you  please,  of  course.  I  shall  await  your  pleasure  on  the 
piazza." 

And  he  stamped  out  and  away  into  the  moonlight,  passing 
the  silent  intruder  with  a  look  which  said  loudly  that  he  would 
have  kicked  him  if  it  had  promised  to  be  worth  the  trouble. 

The  silver  cord  was  loosed.  The  village-clock,  quarter  of  a 
mile  away,  struck  nine,  and  all 's  well.  Hugo  Canning's  stately 
back  receded.  Coincidently  the  shabby-looking  stranger  who 
had  displaced  him  stepped  forward  into  the  summer-house.  The 
first  thing  Carlisle  noticed  about  him  was  that  he  was  lame. 


Dialogue  between  V.  Vivian,  of  the  Slums,  and  Mr.  Beth' s  Daughter 
(or  his  Niece);  what  the  lovely  Hun  saw  in  the  Mr.  Vivian's  eyes, 
just  before  he  asked  God  to  pity  her. 

DALHOUSIE'S  tall  friend  advanced  with  a  limp,  in  si 
lence.  He  halted  at  a  courteous  distance;  it  was  seen 
that  one  hand  held  a  soft  hat,  crushed  against  his  side. 
A  faint  wave  of  the  ethereal  light  immersed  the  man  now,  and 
Carlisle  dimly  descried  his  face.  She  observed  at  once  that  it  did 
not  seem  to  be  a  menacing  face  at  all;  no,  rather  was  it  kindly 
disposed  and  even  somewhat  trustful  in  its  look.  It  was  the 
second  thing  that  she  noticed  about  him. 

Perhaps  no  girl  in  the  world  was  less  like  the  popular  portrait 
of  a  fat  horse-leech's  daughter  than  this  girl,  Carlisle  Heth. 
Surely  no  advance  ever  less  resembled  the  charge  of  a  hating 
prophet  upon  a  Hun  than  this  man's  advance.  Carlisle,  to  be 
sure,  was  never  one  to  think  in  historical  or  Biblical  terminology. 
But  she  did  note  the  man's  manner  of  approach  upon  her,  and  his 
general  appearance,  with  an  instant  lifting  of  the  heart.  The 
whole  matter  seemed  desperately  serious  to  her,  full  of  alarming 
possibilities,  a  matter  for  a  determined  fight.  And  she  felt  more 
confidence  at  once,  the  moment  she  had  seen  how  the  emissary 
looked,  how  he  looked  at  her. 

Chiefly  for  strategic  reasons,  she  had  sat  down  on  the  bench 
again,  well  back  in  the  shadows.  She  did  not  speak;  had  no 
intention  of  speaking  till  speech  might  gain  something.  And 
the  stranger,  silent  also,  wore  an  air  of  hesitancy  or  confusion 
which  was  puzzling  to  her  and  yet  quite  reassuring,  too.  If  he 
had  come  to  say  that  Dalhousie  would  talk  unless  she  did, 
would  he  be  this  sort  of  looking  person  at  all?  .  .  . 

The  man  began  abruptly;  clearly  nothing  plotted  out  in 
advance. 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"He  's  quite  crushed.  ...  I  —  I've  just  come  from  him  ..." 

And  then,  hurriedly  running  his  fingers  through  his  hair,  he 
retraced  his  steps  for  a  better  start. 

"I  should  first  say  how  kind  it  is  of  you  to  receive  a — a 
stranger,  in  this  way.  I  need  hardly  say  that  I  appreciate  it, 
greatly.  .  .  .  And  I  bring  his  hope  that  you  can  be  merciful,  and 
forgive  him  for  what  he  did.  He  is  badly  broken,  that  I  promise 
you.  ...  It's  all  so  curiously  confused.  But  it  does  n't  seem  that 
he  can  be  quite  so  bad  as  they're  saying  here  to-night  ..." 

The  stranger  hesitated;  he  was  gazing  down  with  grave  intent- 
ness. 

"Miss  Heth,  Dal  swears  he  can't  remember  the  boat's  upset 
ting  at  all." 

His  tone  expressed,  oddly,  not  so  much  a  contradiction  of  any 
body  as  a  somewhat  ingenuous  hope  for  corroboration :  Carlisle's 
ear  caught  that  note  at  once.  She  was  observing  Jack  Dalhousie's 
shabby  friend  as  a  determined  adversary  observes.  He  had 
moved  a  little  nearer,  or  else  the  pale  light  better  accustomed 
itself  to  him.  And  she  saw  that  his  face,  though .  manifestly 
young,  had  an  old-fashioned  sort  of  look  which  seemed  to  go 
with  his  worn  clothes;  a  quaint  face,  as  she  regarded  it,  odd- 
looking  in  some  elusive  way  about  the  eyes,  but,  she  felt  surer 
and  surer,  not  dangerous  at  all. 

Now  her  gaze,  shifting,  had  fastened  upon  his  tie,  which  was 
undeniably  quaint;  a  very  large  four-in-hand  showing  pictori- 
ally,  as  it  seemed,  a  black  sea  holding  for  life  a  school  of  fat  white 
fish.  And  then  there  came  a  lovely  voice  from  the  shadows  — 
lovely,  but  did  it  sound  just  a  little  hard?  .  .  . 

"Perhaps  you  had  better  begin  at  the  beginning,  and  tell  me 
who  you  are,  and  what  it  is  you  want." 

"  Yes,  yes !  Quite  so ! "  agreed  the  author  of  the  Severe  Arraign 
ment,  rather  hastily.  .  .  . 

A  little  easier  said  than  done,  no  doubt.  Yet  it  may  be  that 
one  of  the  young  man's  inner  selves  still  hovered  over  the  belief 
that  this  girl  must  be  Mr.  Heth's  (of  the  Works)  niece,  or  haply  a 
yet  more  distant  relative.  .  .  . 

"I  mentioned  that,"  said  he,  "because  it  was  naturally  upper- 

49 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

most  in  my  mind.  I  —  ah  ...  But  to  begin  at  the  beginning, 
as  you  say  ...  I  got  a  telegram  in  town,  telling  me  that  Jack 
Dalhousie  was  in  serious  trouble.  It  was  from  Hofheim,  a  fellow, 
a  sort  of  druggist,  who  happened  to  know  that  I  was  one  of  his 
best  friends.  So  I  caught  the  six-ten  train  and  Hofheim  met  me 
at  the  station.  My  name's  Vivian  .  .  ." 

He  stopped  short,  with  an  odd  air  of  not  having  intended  to 
stop  at  this  point  at  all.  So  bystanders  have  watched  the  learning 
bicycle  rider,  irresistibly  drawn  to  his  doom  against  the  only 
fixed  object  in  miles.  However,  no  association  of  ideas  woke  in 
the  mind  of  the  silent  girl  upon  the  bench.  Not  easily  at  any 
time  did  brick-throwing  Socialists  gain  foothold  there;  and  this 
day  had  been  a  disruptive  one  for  her,  beyond  any  in  her  experi 
ence. 

"The  name,"  hastily  continued  the  young  man,  with  an  intake 
of  breath,  "  probably  conveys  nothing  to  you.  I  — I  merely 
mention  it.  ...  Well,  Hofheim,  this  sort  of  —  fellow,  was  n't  in 
the  hotel  when  the  —  the  occurrence  took  place,  but  he  told  me 
what  everybody  was  saying,  as  we  came  up  in  the  'bus  together. 
I  feel  very  sure  you  can  have  no  idea.  .  .  .  Shall  I  repeat  his 
story?  I  don't,  of  course,  want  to  trouble  you  needlessly." 

"Do." 

So  bidden,  he  swiftly  epitomized  the  narrative  told  him  by  the 
fellow  Hofheim,  who  had  got  it  at  fifth  or  sixth  hand  after  Mrs. 
Heth's  striking  of  the  right  note.  The  Hofheim  rendering  seemed 
to  include  such  details  as  that  Dalhousie  (being  an  entire  stranger 
to  Miss  Heth)  had  overthrown  her  boat  with  homicidal  hands, 
and  that,  as  he  swam  away,  he  had  laughed  repeatedly  and 
maniacally  over  his  shoulder  at  the  girl's  agonized  screams. 

"They  don't  say  that  he  struck  you  —  with  an  oar,"  the  man 
concluded,  sad  and  satirical.  "I  believe  that's  the  only  detail  of 
the  sort  they  omit.  ...  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Miss  Heth,  Dal  says 
he  never  heard  you  scream  at  all." 

Then  he  clearly  paused  for  a  reply,  perhaps  a  reassuring  burst ; 
but  there  was  only  silence.  The  harried  girl  on  the  bench  was 
thinking,  intently  but  with  some  bewilderment.  Somewhat 
aghast  as  she  was  (truth  to  tell)  at  the  way  in  which  the  minor 

50 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

variations  had  been  maliciously  distorted,  her  attention  had  been 
closely  engaged  by  the  curious  way  in  which  Mr.  Dalhousie's 
friend  was  going  at  things.  Why  did  he  sound  less  like  a  chal 
lenge  and  a  threat  than  like  somebody  whistling  hopefully  to 
keep  up  his  courage? 

The  question  irresistibly  emerged.  Carlisle's  slim  fingers 
furled  and  unfurled  the  end  of  her  mermaiden's  scarf,  and  she 
looked  up  at  the  tall  stranger  in  the  dusk  and  sweetly  spoke  for 
the  third  time. 

"But  I  don't  understand.  If  he  has  told  you  all  about  it,  I  — 
I  don't  see  why  you  have  come  to  me  at  all." 

Then  the  man  appeared  to  recollect  that  he  had  omitted  the 
most  important  part  of  his  narrative  —  of  course  she  did  n't 
understand,  no  wonder!  —  and  spoke  with  some  eagerness. 

"I  should  have  explained  that  in  the  beginning!  —  only  of 
course  I  don't  like  to  trespass  too  far  on  your  time.  .  .  .  You  see 
—  unfortunately  —  Dai's  hardly  in  position  to  speak  about  the 
matter  at  all.  I—" 

He  paused,  as  if  seeking  how  to  put  it,  and  then  spoke  these 
doubt-destroying  words: 

"It  is  very  perplexing,  but  the  truth  is  —  he  says  so  him 
self  —  he  does  n't  know  at  all  what  took  place." 

"Oh!  .  .  .  He  does  n't  know!  " 

"I  don't  wonder  you're  astonished  at  his  saying  so,"  said  the 
young  man,  in  quite  a  gentle  way.  "And  yet  I  do  believe  him 
absolutely  ..." 

He  now  explained,  in  well-selected  phrases,  that  Jack  Dalhousie 
had  been  very  drunk  when  he  boarded  the  boat,  having  taken 
a  running  start  on  the  evening  preceding.  Though  he  might  have 
seemed  normal  enough,  through  long  experience  in  control,  he 
was  actually  quite  irresponsible;  and  drink  had  played  strange 
tricks  with  his  mind  before  now.  The  boy  could  remember  get 
ting  into  the  boat,  it  seemed;  remember  that  —  ah  —  that  she 
had  objected  (very  properly)  to  his  presence;  remember  standing 
up  in  the  boat,  very  angry,  and  the  wind  blowing  in  his  face.  The 
next  thing  he  remembered  was  being  in  the  water,  swimming 
away.  And  then,  when  he  landed,  a  man  standing  there  on  shore 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

cursed  him  and  struck  him  in  the  face  .  .  .  Then  he  had  looked 
out  over  the  water;  he  saw  the  upset  sailboat  and  the  boatman 
rowing  out,  and  the  people,  and  it  rushed  over  him  what  he  must 
have  done.  Till  then,  he  said,  he  had  never  dreamed  that  any 
thing  had  happened.  He  could  hardly  believe  it,  even  with  the 
evidence  of  his  own  eyes.  Then  later  Hofheim,  the  sort  of  fellow, 
had  gone  up  to  see  him,  and  told  him  what  people  were  saying, 
which  so  much  more  than  confirmed  his  worst  suspicions.  Hof 
heim  was  a  stranger,  but  he  meant  well.  .  .  . 

Dalhousie,  in  short,  was  in  the  singular  position  of  having  to 
implore  others  to  assure  him  that  he  had  n't  done  all  these  terri 
ble  things.  And  it  appeared  that  Miss  Carlisle  Heth  was  the  one 
person  in  the  world  who  could  possibly  give  him  that  assurance. 

So  spoke  the  stranger.  That  he  had  scattered  lifelines,  that  all 
his  oratory  had  come  agrapple  with  nature's  first  law,  evidently 
did  not  cross  his  mind.  He  gazed  down  at  the  girl's  dimly  limned 
face,  and  his  gaze  seemed  full  of  an  unconquerable  hopefulness. 

"The  boy's  behavior  has  been  inexcusable  in  any  case,"  he 
said.  "And  be  sure  he's  been  punished,  and  will  be  punished 
severely.  But  ...  it  must  be  that  either  the  —  the  trouble 
did  n't  happen  at  all  as  this  story  says  it  did,  or  if  —  at  the  worst 
—  it  did  happen  that  way,  Dalhousie  was  simply  out  of  his 
mind,  quite  insane,  and  did  n't  know  what  he  was  doing.  He 
is  n't,  of  course,  a  ruffian  or  a  coward.  Won't  you  help  to  make 
them  understand  that?" 

The  girl  raised  her  eyes,  which  in  the  twilight  were  darker 
than  the  'depth  of  water  stilled  at  even.' 

"I  don't  see  the  necessity  for  that,"  she  said,  in  a  firm  voice. 
"  I —  I  'm  afraid  1  can't  consent  to  be  involved  in  it  any  further." 

Over  the  little  summer-house  hung  the  sweet  beauties  of  the 
serene  night.  About  it  stretched  the  calm  lawn  in  chequers  of 
large  faint  brightness  and  gigantic  shadows.  Within  it  stood  the 
tall  stranger,  rooted  in  his  tracks.  Then  it  seemed  to  occur  to 
him  that  there  was  some  misunderstanding;  that  at  least,  in  his 
anxiety  about  his  friend,  he  had  n't  allowed  sufficiently  for  the 
properly  outraged  feelings  of  the  lady  —  this  so  unreasonable- 
looking  daughter  of  Mr.  Heth  of  the  Works,  or  his  niece  .  .  . 

52 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"It's  all  tremendously  trying  for  you,  I  know,"  he  said,  with 
the  same  sort  of  gentleness.  "I  assure  you  the  situation  has  dis 
tressed  me  greatly  —  from  every  aspect.  And  I  think  it 's  most 
kind  and  —  and  generous  of  you  to  let  me  speak  with  you  when 
you  must  feel  that  you've  been  so  badly  treated.  .  .  .  But  you 
see  —  as  it  stands,  you  are  involved  in  it,  really,  more  than  any 
one  else.  I  'm  sorry,  but  in  fact  the  whole  issue  is  in  your  hands." 

"I  can't  see  that.  He  has  given  you  his  —  his  version  of  what 
took  place.  No  one  will  prevent  him  from  saying  the  same  thing 
to  whomever  he  wishes." 

"But  who  will  believe  him?" 

Carlisle  perceived  a  rhetorical  question,  though  she  didn't 
know  it  under  that  name;  she  made  no  reply.  She  would  really 
have  preferred  no  more  questions  of  any  sort  —  what  was  the 
use  of  them?  In  her,  as  in  all  the  Maker's  creatures,  the  in 
stinct  for  self-preservation  was  planted  to  work  resistlessly. 
Small  wonder,  indeed,  if,  in  the  unexpected  discovery  that 
dependence  on  Dalhousie's  dubious  gentlemanliness  was  un 
necessary,  the  uprush  of  relief  should  have  swept  away  all  lesser 
considerations,  flooded  down  all  doubts.  All  was  settled  again 
in  a  trice,  as  by  a  miracle:  the  miraculous  agent  here  being,  not 
the  Deity  (as  she  vaguely  suspected),  but  only  the  Demon  Rum, 
he  who  had  taught  the  frail  lad  Dalhousie  to  be  so  mistrustful  of 
himself  .  .  . 

She  had  had  a  harassing  day,  including  three  momentous 
tete-a-t&es  with  three  different  and  widely  variegated  men, 
mostly  comparative  strangers:  Jack  Dalhousie,  Mr.  Canning, 
and  now  this  Mr.  Vivian.  She  was  very  tired  of  being  dogged 
and  nagged  at  and  interfered  with,  and  she  wanted  very  much 
to  terminate  this  interview,  which  she  saw  now  had  been  ex 
torted  from  her  by  a  pretty  sharp  piece  of  deception.  And 
through  her  mind  there  skipped  a  beckoning  thought  of  Mr. 
Canning,  conceived  as  feverishly  pacing  the  piazza  .  .  . 

"You  see,  his  defence,"  Mr.  Vivian  was  saying,  with  some 
signs  of  nervousness,  "is  merely  his  own  word  that  he  had  no 
idea  you  were  upset.  I  believe  him  absolutely,  because  I  know 
he  would  n't  lie,  and  he  admits,  to  his  own  disadvantage,  that  his 

53 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


memory  is  n't  at  all  clear.  But  —  it's  all  so  muddled  and  con 
fused  somehow  —  I  'm  afraid  everybody  else  will  think  that  a 
rather  silly  fabrication,  invented  by  a  desperate  man  to  put 
himself  in  the  best  light  possible.  That  is  —  unless  his  word  is 
corroborated." 

His  inflection  invited  remarks,  nay,  urged  them,  but  there  was 
only  silence. 

And  then  within  V.  Vivian,  M.D.,  there  woke  a  cold  doubt, 
and  gnawed  him. 

"  Miss  Heth  —  I  must  ask  —  for  the  whole  moral  question 
hangs  on  this  .  .  .  Did  he  know  that  you  were  upset?" 

Miss  Heth  cleared  her  throat,  preparatory  to  rising.  She  saw 
now  that  she  ought  never  to  have  consented  to  talk  with  this 
strange  man  at  alL  Mamma  would  have  known  that  in  advance. 

"It  is  —  rather  absurd  —  for  me  to  be  asked  to  decide  what 
he  knew.  He  has  assured  you  that  — " 

"But  —  I  don't  make  myself  clear,  I  see  —  the  fact  is  that 
yours  is  the  only  assurance  that  will  carry  the  smallest  weight  on 
that  point.  .  .  .  He  was  n't  —  may  I  ask?  —  actually  in  the  boat 
when  it  went  over,  was  he?" 

"N-no.  As  to  that  —  I  believe  he  had  just  got  out,  but  — '* 

"Did  you  think  at  the  time  that  he  knew  you  were  upset?" 

"Unfortunately,  I  am  not  a  mind  reader,"  she  began  with  dig 
nity,  objecting  seriously  to  these  obstacles  in  the  way  of  ending 
the  interview.  "  Thrown  without  warning  into  the  water,  I  could 
not  look  into  his  thoughts  and  see  — " 

"  Quite  so.  But  did  he  show  in  any  way  that  he  knew  you  were 
upset?" 

A  kind  of  chill  had  crept  into  the  stranger's  voice.  The  two 
young  people  gazed  at  each  other.  The  man  had  strange  eyes 
(they  were  the  third  thing  she  had  noticed  about  him),  gray,  she 
thought,  and  gifted  with  an  odd  sort  of  translucence,  singular 
and  speaking. 

"  Let  me  see.  No,  he  did  not.  That  is  what  I  said  at  the  time 
—  that  he  did  n't  take  the  slightest  notice  of  me  — " 

"He  swears  he  never  dreamed  anything  was  wrong  till  he 
landed.  Don't  you  feel  that  that 's  quite  possible,  at  least  ?  Or ... 

54 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

did  you  scream  out  for  his  help,  so  loudly  that  he  must  have 
heard  you,  if  he  'd  been  himself?" 

"  The  —  the  first  few  minutes  in  the  water  were  very  confusing. 
I  can't  pretend  to  say  exactly  what  I  did  or  did  n't  do.  I  had  to 
think  about  saving  my  life  — " 

"Of  course.  But  if  you'd  screamed  a  number  of  times  in 
saving  your  life,  you  would  be  likely  to  remember  it,  would  n't 
you?" 

"Really  I  can't  acknowledge  your  right  to  — " 

"  Miss  Heth  —  why  did  n't  you  scream  ?  " 

His  swift  cross-examination  touched  the  quick  of  her  spirit;  and 
she  came  to  her  feet,  trembling  a  little,  and  feeling  rather  white. 

"I  will  not  allow  you  to  catechise  me  in  this  way.  I  will 
not  .  .  ." 

Dr.  Vivian,  from  the  Dabney  House,  over  the  Gulf,  stood  still, 
quite  silenced.  .  .  . 

The  thought  had  struck  V.  Vivian,  and  shot  him  down,  that 
this  girl  was  lying,  deliberately  suppressing  the  truth  that  meant 
more  than  life  to  Dal.  She  had  n't  screamed.  Dal  had  n't  known 
she  was  upset.  ....  Yet  was  it  thinkable?  In  the  fiercest  denoun 
cing  of  the  yellowest  Huns,  who  had  ever  dreamed  anything  so 
base  of  them  as  this?  Lying  ?  With  that  face  like  all  the  angels, 
that  voice  like  a  heavenly  choir?  .  .  . 

The  tall  doctor  saw  that  his  suspicion  was  unworthy  and 
absurd.  His  was  no  simple  choice  between  his  friend's  shameful 
cowardice,  and  this  girl's  criminal  falsehood.  No,  Dal  was  crazy- 
drunk  at  the  time,  and  himself  cried  out  in  his  misery  that  the 
worst  that  they  said  of  him  was  probably  true.  And  even  sup 
posing  that  this  girl  was  no  more  than  a  fiend  in  seraphic  shape, 
what  conceivable  reason  could  she  have  for  such  infamous  sup 
pression?  Motive  was  unimaginable.  .  .  .  No,  the  fault  must  be 
his  own.  He  had  pressed  too  hard,  pried  too  tactlessly  and 
inquisitively,  not  made  her  understand  sufficiently  the  dire  swift 
ness  of  the  poor  boy's  need  .  .  . 

These  two  stood  face  to  face.  Carlisle  saw  that  Jack  Dal- 
housie's  friend  was  becoming  excited;  but  then,  so  was  she.  The 
man  spoke  first,  in  a  low,  hurried  voice: 

55 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"I  don't  mean  to  catechise  —  indeed,  I  don't.  You  must  try 
to  forgive  me  for  the  liberties  I  seem  to  be  taking.  .  .  .  The 
thing's  so  serious,  so  pitiful.  This  story  already  flying  around 
back  in  town  —  making  him  a  base  coward  —  he  '11  never  live  it 
down.  And  it 's  to-night  or  never,  a  —  a  misstatement  travels  so 
fast  and  far,  and  has  so  long  a  life  — " 

"You  should  have  reminded  him  of  all  this,"  said  Carlisle, 
her  rounded  breast  rising  and  falling,  "  before  he  got  into  my 
boat." 

"Oh,  you  have  a  right  to  say  that!  He's  been  wrong,  insanely 
wrong!  But  does  he  deserve  disgrace  —  ostracism  —  ruin?  You 
alone  stand  between  him  and  — " 

"I  don't  feel  that  it  —  it's  right  for  me  to  be  brought  into  it 
further.  I've  explained  that.  And  I  must  ask  — " 

"  But  you  are  in  it  already,  you  see.  Whatever  anybody  does 
or  leaves  undone,  now  and  for  the  future  —  you  are  in  it  .  .  ." 

The  enemy  paused,  gazing  at  her;  and  then  suddenly,  be 
fore  she  could  make  just  the  right  opening  to  go  past  him,  he 
abandoned  restraint,  and  flung  himself  upon  entreaties. 

"Could  n't  you  make  a  statement  —  just  a  little  statement  — 
saying  that  you  feel  certain  he  did  n't  know  the  boat  was  upset? 
that  perhaps  in  the  excitement  you  forgot  to  scream?  —  that  you 
know  he  would  n't  have  left  you  if  he  'd  understood  you  were  in 
trouble?  Could  n't  you  at  least  give  him  the  benefit  of  the 
doubt?  —  say  or  do  something  to  show  you  've  no  bitter  feeling 
toward  him?  — " 

"  Did  he  show  any  regard  for  my  feelings  ?  I  must  ins  — 

" All  the  finer  is  your  opportunity  —  don't  you  see?  .  .  .  Even 
strain  the  truth  a  little  for  him,  if  that's  necessary.  God,"  said 
the  shabby  young  man,  quite  passionately,  "would  count  it  a  vir 
tue,  I  know,  for  it 's  now  or  never  to  save  a  man.  .  .  .  Could  n't 
you  do  that?  I  promise  you  you  won't  be  bothered  any  more 
about  it.  I  know  how  awfully  hard  it's  all  been  for  you. 
Could  n't  you  say  something  to  help  him  a  little?" 

Miss  Heth,  facing  him,  imperceptibly  hesitated. 

For  a  second,  offended  though  she  was  by  his  religious  re 
ference  (she  never  heard  the  name  of  God  mentioned  in  polite 

56 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

society),  this  quaint  begging  Mr.  Vivian  had  her  upon  the 
balance.  Her  flying  thoughts  swept  down  the  parting  of  the 
ways.  But  they  flew  swiftly  back,  stabbing  all  hesitancies.  .  .  . 

She  wished  as  much  as  any  one  that  it  had  all  been  started 
differently,  as  it  might  have  been  had  she  been  perfectly  certain 
in  advance  that  no  one  would  dare  say  anything  the  least  bit 
horrid  about  her.  It  was  not  her  fault  that  gossip  was  so  notori 
ously  unreliable.  And  now  it  was  simply  impossible  to  rake  up 
the  whole  subject  again,  just  when  it  was  all  settled,  and  go 
through  another  long  explanation  with  mamma.  Of  course  she 
did  n't  believe  all  this  about  Dalhousie's  being  ruined  and  dis 
graced  forever:  that  was  just  the  man's  way  of  working  on  her 
feelings  and  trying  to  frighten  her.  She  knew  very  well  that  the 
whole  thing  would  blow  over  in  a  few  days,  if  just  quietly  left  to 
itself. 

And  what  use,  whispered  the  returning  thoughts,  would  the 
unknown  make  of  the  "little  statement"  he  begged  so  for? 
What  would  mamma  say,  for  instance,  to  a  black-typed  piece-in- 
the-paper  in  the  "  Post "  to-morrow?  And  what  of  Mr.  Canning 
—  nudged  the  wise  thoughts  —  the  happiness  symbol  on  the 
piazza,  whose  princely  feet  were  so  plainly  twitching  to  thunder 
behind?  .  .  . 

No;  clearly  the  only  sensible  thing  to  do  was  to  end  all  the 
talk  and  quibbling  at  once,  definitely.  Carlisle  took  a  step  for 
ward  over  the  dim  chequered  floor,  resolute  as  her  mother. 

"I  can't  add  anything  to  what  I've  already  said.  I  cannot 
let  you  detain  me  any  longer." 

Her  advance  had  brought  her  fully  into  what  light  there  was, 
falling  mistily  through  lattice  and  door.  And  at  the  look  in  her 
eyes,  young  Dr.  Vivian's  hands  fell  dead  without  a  struggle  at 
his  sides.  His  tall  figure  seemed  mysteriously  to  shrink  and 
collapse  inside  his  clothes.  He  said,  oddly,  nothing  whatever. 
Yet  an  hour's  oration  could  not  have  conveyed  more  convin 
cingly  his  sense  of  irreparable  disaster. 

The  instantaneous  cessation  of  his  verbal  flow  curiously  piqued 
the  girl's  attention.  Face  to  face  as  they  stood,  she  was  struck 
quite  sharply  with  an  elusive  something  that  seemed  to  cling  to 

57 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


this  man's  look,  a  subtle  enveloping  wistfulness  which  she  had 
vaguely  noticed  about  him  before,  which  somehow  seemed, 
indeed,  only  the  sum  of  all  that  she  had  noticed  about  him  before. 
It  may  have  been  this  look  that  briefly  checked  her  withdrawal. 
An  odd  desire  to  justify  herself  somewhat  more  clearly  fluttered 
and  stirred  within  her.  Or  —  who  can  say?  —  perhaps  this  was 
no  more  than  the  beautiful  woman's  undying  desire  to  appear 
at  advantage  before  every  man,  however  far  beneath  her. 

"You  —  you  must  not  think  me  unfeeling,"  she  said  in  a 
sweet  hurried  voice.  "  I  want  to  be  as  considerate  as  possible.  I 
am  terribly  sorry  for  him  —  terribly  —  and  you  must  tell  him 
so,  from  me.  But  I  —  I  am  in  a  peculiar  position.  I  am  not 
free  to—" 

"I  see.  I  understand  now." 

His  strange  tone  fell  upon  her  ears  as  a  challenge,  quiet  though 
it  was;  and  it  was  a  challenge  which  Carlisle,  though  instantly 
regretting  her  generosity  (when  she  might  just  have  walked 
away),  saw  no  entirely  dignified  way  of  avoiding. 

"You  see  what?"  she  said,  faltering  a  little.  "I  don't  know 
what  you  mean." 

The  man  replied  slowly,  almost  as  if  he  were  thinking  of 
something  else,  and  the  thought  rather  hurt  him : 

"I  see  your  only  thought  is  to  gain  some  point  for  yourself  — 
you  alone  know  what  —  no  matter  what  pain  your  silence  may 
give  to  others  .  .  .  Ah,  that's  sad  ..." 

Angry  and  a  little  frightened,  too,  Carlisle  Heth  drew  hei 
gossamer  shawl  more  closely  about  her  shoulders,  with  a  move 
ment  that  also  wore  the  air  of  plucking  together  her  somewhat 
wavering  hauteur. 

"  You  are  at  liberty  to  think  and  say  what  you  please,"  she 
said,  distantly;  and  with  a  slight  inclination  of  her  head  started 
past  him. 

But  he  did  not  seem  to  hear  the  dismissal  order;  stood  unmov- 
ing,  blocking  her  progress;  and  looking  up  with  now  tremulous 
indignation,  Carlisle  ran  once  more  full  on  the  battery  of  his 
speaking  eyes.  .  .  . 

Perhaps  it  was  not  difficult  to  guess  what  John  the  Baptist 

58 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

would  have  said,  in  such  a  case  as  this :  but  then  the  young  man 
V.  V.  was  not  thinking  of  John  the  Baptist  now.  He  was  not 
feeling  grim  at  all  at  this  moment;  not  fierce  at  all.  So  in  his  look 
there  was  to  be  seen  nothing  of  the  whiplash,  not  one  thing  remi 
niscent  of  the  abhorring  fanatic  on  the  outskirts  of  the  city.  His 
eyes  were  filled,  indeed,  with  a  sudden  compassion;  a  compassion 
overflowing,  unmistakable,  and  poignant.  And  from  that  look 
the  richly  dressed  girl  with  the  seraph's  face  instantly  averted 
her  gaze. 

She  heard  a  voice:  the  lame  stranger  speaking  as  if  to  himself. 

"All  that  beauty  without,  and  nothing  at  all  within.  ...  So 
lovely  to  the  eye,  and  empty  where  the  heart  should  be.  .  .  . 
God  pity  you,  poor  little  thing  .  .  ." 

And  then  Carlisle  passed  him  quickly  and  went  out  of  the  sum 
mer-house  upon  the  lawn.  The  escape,  this  time,  presented  no 
difficulties.  For  the  last  syllable  had  hardly  died  on  the  young 
man's  lip  before  self-consciousness  appeared  to  return  upon  him, 
staggering  him,  it  may  be,  at  the  words  of  his  mouth.  He 
turned,  abruptly,  and  fled  in  the  other  direction. 

So  the  audience  in  the  moonlit  summer-house  concluded 
precipitately,  with  the  simultaneous  departure  of  both  parties 
from  opposite  exits.  Carlisle  Heth  went  hurrying  across  the  lawn. 
Within  her,  there  was  a  tumult;  but  her  will  was  not  feeble, 
and  her  sense  of  decorum  and  the  eternally  fitting  hardly  less 
tenacious.  Strongly  she  ruled  her  spirit  for  the  revivifying  re- 
meeting  that  awaited  her  just  ahead  .  .  . 

But  it  was  not  Mr.  Canning's  voice  which  greeted  her  as  she 
stepped  up  on  the  hotel  piazza.  It  was  the  low,  angry  challenge 
of  her  soldier-mother,  nipped  in  the  act  of  charging  upon  the 
summer-house. 

"Carlisle!  ...  In  heaven's  name,  what  have  you  been  doing?" 

Facing  mamma  on  the  deserted  piazza-end,  Carlisle  explained 
in  a  hurried  sentence  that  Mr.  Dalhousie  had  sent  a  pleading 
friend  to  her,  whom  she  had  felt  obliged  to  see.  .  .  . 

"Are  you  mad  to  say  such  a  thing?  Was  it  for  wild  antics  of 
this  sort  that  I  threw  everything  to  the  winds  to  bring  you  down 
here?" 

59 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Oh,  mamma  —  please!"  said  Carlisle,  her  breath  coming 
fast.  "I've  had  about  enough.  ...  I  —  I  couldn't  run  the 
risk  of  his  starting  heaven  knows  what  scandalous  story.  Where 
is  Mr.  Canning?" 

Mamma  looked  as  if  she  wanted  to  shake  her. 

"You  may  well  ask,"  she  said,  savagely,  and  turned  away. 

"I  do  ask,"  said  Carlisle,  with  returning  spirit.  "Where  is 
he?" 

Mrs.  Heth  wheeled  on  her. 

"  Did  you  suppose  he  would  hang  about  kicking  his  heels  for 
hours  while  you  hobnobbed  with  low  men  in  dark  summer- 
houses?  He  just  excused  himself  on  the  ground  of  a  cold  caught 
on  the  piazza,  and  has  retired  for  the  night.  You  shall  do  the 
same.  Come  with  me." 

Carlisle  went  with  her. 

And  next  morning,  Sunday,  the  very  first  news  that  greeted 
the  two  ladies,  upon  their  appearance  for  a  late  breakfast,  was 
that  Mr.  Canning  and  Mr.  Kerr  had  left  the  Beach  for  town  by 
the  nine-twenty-two  train. 


VI 


Of  Carlisle's  Bewilderment  over  all  the  Horrid  Talk ;  of  how  it 
was  n't  her  fault  that  Gossip  was  so  Unreliable  ;  of  the  Greatest 
Game  in  the  World ;  also,  of  Mr.  Beth,  who  did  n't  look  like  a 
Shameless  Homicide. 

THE  explosion  that  followed  the*  boat  occurrence  at  the 
Beach  came  as  a  complete  surprise  to  the  heroine  of 
the  small  affair.  When  she  had  terminated  the  inter 
view  in  the  summer-house,  she  understood  that  she  was  giving 
the  signal  for  talk  to  cease  and  all  trouble  to  proceed  to  blow 
over.  The  want  of  cooperation  on  the  part  of  talk  and  trouble 
was  gross,  to  say  the  least  of  it.  The  tide  of  excited  questions 
and  comment  that  poured  in  on  and  around  Carlisle,  upon  her 
return  to  town  on  Monday,  resembled  the  breaking  of  flood 
gates.  Her  small  and  entirely  private  misadventure  had  become 
her  world's  sensation.  And  within  a  day  there  came  a  climax 
which  secretly  astonished  and  frightened  her  not  a  little.  The 
primal  blood-tie  itself  was  severed  for  offended  righteousness' 
sake.  The  proud  old  widower,  Colonel  Dalhousie,  already  sorely 
tried  by  his  son's  wildnesses,  could  not  stomach  his  flagrant 
cowardice.  It  was  shouted  about  the  town  that  he  had  cut  Jack 
off  with  a  curse,  and  turned  him  finally  out  of  his  house. 

Unplagued  by  the  curses  of  imagination,  Carlisle  had,  in 
deed,  anticipated  nothing  in  the  least  like  this.  She  was  dazed 
by  the  undreamed  hubbub.  For  the  first  few  days  after  her  home 
coming,  she  remained  very  closely  in  the  house,  to  avoid  all  the 
worrying  and  horrid  talk;  and  one  day,  the  day  Mattie  Allen  ran 
in  with  popping  eyes  to  tell  her  about  Jack  Dalhousie,  she  pre 
tended  to  be  sick  and  stayed  in  bed,  and  really  did  feel  extremely 
badly. 

In  these  days  of  uneasiness,  Carlisle  wished  far  more  than 

61 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

ever  that  the  whole  thing  had  been  started  differently;  and  she 
wondered  often,  and  somewhat  fearfully,  if  Dalhousie's  friend, 
Mr.  Vivian,  would  try  to  force  himself  on  her  again.  That  did 
not  happen ;  nothing  happened;  and  the  more  and  more  calmly 
she  came  to  think  about  it  all,  the  more  clearly  the  girl  saw 
that  she  personally  was  not  to  blame  for  the  misunderstanding. 
It  was  plainly  seen  as  one  of  those  unfortunate  occurrences  which, 
while  regretted  by  all,  herself  as  much  as  anybody,  you  simply 
could  not  do  a  single  thing  about.  And  if  it  had  seemed  impos 
sible  to  rake  it  all  up  again  even  that  night,  how  much  more 
unrakable  was  it  now,  when  days  had  passed,  and  everybody 
had  accepted  everything,  for  better  or  worse,  as  it  was?  Fate 
and  gossip  had  proved  too  strong.  Deplorable,  indeed;  but  it 
was  to  be,  that  was  all. 

It  was  very  plain,  of  course,  that  all  the  initial  excitement  and 
pother  could  not  possibly  last.  Withhold  food  from  gossip,  and 
it  starves  and  dies.  Carlisle  simply  stayed  quiet  and  held  her 
tongue;  and  as  the  days  passed  without  more  developments  of 
any  sort,  she  found  her  philosophical  attitude  thoroughly  justified 
by  events.  Town-talk,  that  bugbear  of  the  delicate-minded,  shot 
off  first  to  the  Hoover  divorce,  and  then  to  the  somewhat  public 
disagreement  between  the  Governor  of  the  State  and  Congress 
man  Hardwicke,  at  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  luncheon  for  the 
visiting  President;  finally  to  a  number  of  things.  By  the  time 
six  weeks  had  passed,  the  Beach  had  dropped  completely  from 
the  minds  of  a  fickle  public.  Dalhousie,  it  seemed,  had  consid 
erately  vanished.  Talk  ceased.  The  boat  trouble  blew  over, 
much  as  the  boat  had  done.  .  .  . 

About  this  time,  namely,  about  the  middle  of  the  seventh 
week,  one  of  Willie  Kerr's  cryptic  messages  lay  beside  Mrs. 
Heth's  breakfast  plate  on  a  morning.  It  ran: 

I  think  he  will  come  at  5.30  o'clock 
Wednesday.    Better  arrive  first? 

W.  K. 

Willie's  cipher  (he  liked  to  write  as  if  he  lived  in  Russia,  with 
the  postal  spies  after  him  like  hawks)  was  no  mystery  to  Mrs. 

62 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

Heth,  she  being,  in  a  certain  measure,  its  inventor.  Having 
taken  the  telegraphic  brevity  upstairs  to  show  to  Carlisle,  she 
disappeared  into  the  telephone  booth,  to  rearrange  her  afternoon. 
If  all  subscribers  to  the  telephonic  system  were  as  tireless  users  as 
she,  probably  fewer  people  would  have  made  large  fortunes  by 
the  timely  purchase  of  forty  dollars  worth  of  stock. 

This  was  a  Wednesday  morning  in  mid-December.  Carlisle, 
recuperating  from  a  gay  debutante  rout  on  the  evening  preceding, 
remained  in  bed.  By  this  time  the  "  season  "  was  well  under  way: 
all  signs  promised  an  exceptionally  gay  winter,  and  Carlisle  was, 
as  ever,  in  constant  demand.  She  had  meant  to  spend  the  morn 
ing  in  bed  anyway,  and  then  besides  her  mother  had  pointed  out 
the  necessity  of  being  fresh  for  the  afternoon.  .  .  . 

From  the  moment  of  their  abrupt  parting  at  the  Beach,  Car 
lisle  had  not  set  eyes  upon  Mr.  Canning,  though  he  was  known 
to  have  lingered  as  a  house-guest  all  through  the  following  week. 
The  circumstance  had  surprised  her  considerably  at  the  time, 
until  she  had  thought  out  some  satisfactory  explanations  for  it. 
To-day  her  maidenly  thoughts  assumed  a  wholly  prospective  char 
acter,  very  agreeable  and  cheery.  Mr.  Canning,  having  arrived 
yesterday  from  some  southerly  resort  of  his  choice,  was  again 
staying  at  the  Payne  fort  on  the  Three  Winds  Road,  his  reported 
design  being  to  ride  a  few  times  with  the  Cold  Run  hounds,  other 
wise  barricading  himself  as  unsocially  as  before.  Still,  he  ex 
pected  to  remain  for  a  week  at  least,  which  was  very  nice;  and 
under  these  circumstances  it  was  as  natural  as  possible  that  his 
connoisseurship  should  be  asked  to  pass  judgment  on  the  new 
little  bachelor  apartment  in  Bellingham  Court,  where  his  friend 
Kerr  was  just  comfortably  installed.  .  .  .  Where,  also,  no  im 
possible  stranger  could  intrude  himself  upon  the  company  of  his 
betters,  with  revivalist  vocabulary  and  killjoy  face. 

The  clock  stood  at  eleven.  The  drawn  shades  imparted  a 
restful  dimness  to  the  bedroom,  but  the  reliable  maid  Flora  had 
been  in  to  shut  the  windows  and  start  a  merry  fire  in  the  grate. 
This  room  had  been  done  over  last  year  in  gray  and  old  rose, 
with  the  "suit"  in  Circassian  walnut,  and  wainscoted  walls 
which  harmonized  admirably.  It  ,was  a  charming  cloister,  all 

63 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


most  captivating  to  the  eye,  with  the  possible  exception  of  the 
dressing-table,  which  rather  bristled  with  implements  and  looked 
just  a  thought  too  businesslike. 

Carlisle  loafed  and  invited  her  soul.  Her  glorious  ash-gold 
hair,  whose  habit  of  crinkling  from  the  roots  was  so  exasperat 
ing  to  contemporaries  of  her  own  sex,  swept  loose  over  the  pil 
lows,  charmingly  framing  her  face.  .  .  . 

While  the  Beach  episode  itself  was  now  long  since  closed  and 
done  with,  it  was  not  unnatural  that  the  memory  of  Dalhousie's 
friend,  the  Mr.  Vivian,  should  have  remained  in  Carlisle's  mind, 
for  Mr.  Vivian  had  addressed  such  words  to  her  as  had  never 
before  sounded  upon  her  ears.  These  words  had  clung  by  their 
sheer  astounding  novelty.  To  have  God  petitioned  to  pity  you 
by  a  shabby  nobody  in  a  pictorial  tie:  here  was  an  experience  that 
invited  some  elucidation.  For  a  time  the  girl's  thoughts  had 
attacked  the  nobody's  sincerity:  he  was  merely  failure  pretend 
ing  to  despise  success.  But,  not  ungifted  at  self-suasion  though 
she  was,  she  had  not  seemed  to  find  solid  footing  here;  and  she 
had  early  been  driven  irresistibly  to  quite  a  different  conclusion. 
Evidently  this  man  Mr.  Vivian  was  a  queer  kind  of  street-preacher 
type,  victim  of  a  pious  mania  which  rendered  him  dangerously 
unsound  in  the  head.  This,  obviously,  was  the  truth  of  the  mat 
ter.  On  no  other  theory  could  his  pitying  her  be  satisfactorily 
explained. 

It  was  true  that,  with  the  dying  down  of  her  own  sense  of 
vague  ambient  perils,  she  herself  had  come  once  more  to  feel 
dreadfully  sorry  for  Jack  Dalhousie,  and  even  to  admit  in  her 
meditations  that  she  could  have  afforded  to  be  more  magnani 
mous  in  defending  him  from  gossip.  But  then  that  did  not  at  all 
change  the  fact  that  Dalhousie  deserved  the  severest  punishment 
for  all  the  trouble  and  worry  he  had  brought  her.  It  clearly  was 
not  right,  was  not  moral,  to  make  things  too  easy  for  wrongdoers. 
She  had  gradually  come  to  see  herself  as  a  custodian  of  the  moral 
law  in  this  quarter,  a  tribunal  of  justice  which,  while  upholding 
the  salubriousness  of  punition,  yet  strives  to  keep  as  large  and 
generous  as  it  can. 

Therefore  it  followed  as  the  night  the  day  that  Mr.  Vivian, 

64 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

who  could  work  himself  up  to  the  condition  of  feeling  sorry  for 
her  as  she  discharged  her  painful  duties  (while  admiring  her  love 
liness),  was  a  sort  of  camp-meeting  madman.  He  was  an  ad 
vanced  kind  of  religious  fanatic,  nearly  in  the  foaming  stages, 
something  like  a  whirling  dervish.  His  emotional  gibberings 
were  beneath  the  notice  of  sane,  wholesome  people. 

Still,  in  lengthening  retrospect,  Carlisle  had  become  quite 
dissatisfied  with  the  manner  in  which  she  had  permitted  the 
summer-house  interview  to  terminate.  It  was  somewhat  galling 
to  recall  the  tameness  with  which  she  had  allowed  a  Shouting 
Methodist  such  a  last  word  as  that,  entirely  unreproved.  Be 
cause  unreproved,  the  staggering  word  had  stuck  fast;  in  spite  of 
all  efforts,  it  remained  as  a  considerable  irritation  in  the  back 
ground  of  her  mind.  Many  times  she  had  resolved  that,  if  she 
ever  saw  the  man  again  (which  seemed  unlikely,  as  nobody  ap 
peared  ever  to  have  heard  of  him),  she  would  make  a  point  of 
saying  something  pretty  sharp  and  definite  to  him,  showing 
him  how  little  she  cared  for  the  opinions  of  such  as  he.  And 
then,  at  other  times,  she  decided  that  it  might  be  best  simply 
to  ignore  the  man  altogether,  turning  her  back  with  dignity,  after 
perhaps  one  look  such  as  would  completely  show  him  up.  Let 
sleeping  dogs  lie,  as  they  say.  .  .  . 

She  rose,  in  excellent  spirits,  shortly  after  noon,  and  began  an 
unhurried  toilet.  The  toilet  was  so  unhurried,  indeed,  that 
she  had  hardly  finished  and  descended  tp  the  family  sitting- 
room  on  the  second  floor  when  her  father's  latch-key  was  heard 
clicking  in  the  front  door.  This  sound  was  the  unofficial  lunch 
eon-gong.  The  House  of  Heth  proceeded  to  the  dining-room, 
where  Mr.  Heth  kissed  his  daughter's  cheek  in  jocund  greeting. 

11  Good-afternoon,  Cally!  And  you  just  up  —  well,  well! 
Times  have  changed  — 

'  Early  to  bed,  early  to  rise  — 
That  makes  us  all  healthy, 
Wise  and  wealthy  — ' 

That  was  my  father's  rule,  and  Lord,  he  kept  us  to  it.  .  .  ." 
Mrs.  Heth,  already  seated,  bit  her  lip  slightly,  which  seemed 

65 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


to  confer  prominence  upon  her  little  mustache.  Her  consort's 
habit  of  quoting,  and  especially  of  misquoting,  was  trying  to  her, 
but  she  now  knew  it  to  be  incurable,  like  her  daughter's  occasional 
mannerism.  She  sat  as  usual  rather  silent,  plotting  out  the  next 
few  hours  of  her  busy  time,  her  remarks  being  chiefly  of  a  super 
fluous  managerial  nature  to  that  thoroughly  competent  African, 
Moses  Bruce. 

Carlisle,  having  so  lately  risen,  ate  but  a  dejeuner.  Mr.  Heth, 
on  the  contrary,  attacked  the  viands  with  relish,  restoring  waste 
tissues  from  two  directors'  meetings,  a  meeting  of  the  Conven 
tion  Committee  of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce,  and  an  hour  in  his 
office  at  the  bank.  He  was  a  full-bodied,  good-looking,  amiable- 
mannered  man,  of  sound  stock  and  excellent  digestion,  and  wore 
white  waistcoats  the  year  round,  and  fine  blond  mustaches,  also 
the  year  round.  He  certainly  did  not  look  to  the  casual  eye  like 
a  shameless  homicide,  but  rather  like  an  English  country  gen 
tleman  given  to  dogs.  He  was  fifty-four  years  old,  a  hard  worker 
for  all  his  indolent  eye,  and  his  favorite  diversion  was  about 
twelve  holes  of  golf  on  Sunday  morning,  and  his  next  favorite 
one  table  of  bridge  by  night  in  the  library  across  the  hall. 

Greetings  over,  Mr.  Heth  said  "Catch!"  to  his  wife  and 
daughter,  referring  to  the  ten-dollar  goldpieces  from  the  direc 
tors,  and  remarked  that  he  had  n't  been  near  the  Works  for 
two  mornings,  and  that  money  made  the  mare  go.  A  sober 
look  touched  his  fresh-colored  face  as  he  voiced  these  observa 
tions,  but  then  he  was  tired  and  hungry,  and  nobody  noticed 
the  look  anyway.  This  fashion  of  the  1.30  luncheon  had  been 
one  of  the  earliest  of  their  Yankee  innovations  which  had 
caused  the  rising  Heths  to  be  viewed  with  alleged  alarm  by 
ante-bellum  critics,  dear  old  poorhouse  Tories  who  pretended 
that  they  wanted  only  to  live  as  their  grandsires  had  lived. 
The  Heths,  unterrified,  and  secure  from  the  afternoon  torpor 
inflicted  on  up-to-date  in'ards  by  slave-time  regime,  dispatched 
the  exotic  meal  with  the  cheerfulness  of  Property. 

"Effete,  Cally,  —  that's  what  this  age  is,"  said  Mr.  Heth, 
pushing  back  his  chair,  and  producing  his  gold  toothpick. 
"Everybody  looking  for  somebody  else's  neck  to  hang  on  to. 

66 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


And  makin'  a  lot  of  grafters  out  of  our  poor  class.  Look  at  this 
Labor  Commissioner  and  his  new-fangled  nonsense.  Nagging 
me  to  spend  Lord  knows  how  many  thousands,  making  the 
plant  pretty  and  attractive  for  the  hands.  Voted  for  the  fellow, 
too." 

"I  never  heard  of  such  a  thing.  What  sort  of  things  does  he 
want  you  to  do,  papa?" 

"Turkish  baths  and  manicures  and  chicken  sandwiches,  I 
guess.  I  don't  listen  to  his  rot.  Law  's  good  enough  for  me. 
Point  I  make  is  that 's  the  spirit  of  the  poor  nowadays.  I  pay 
'em  wages  that  would  have  been  thought  enormous  a  hundred 
years  ago,  but  are  they  satisfied?  Not  on  your  life!  .  .  ." 

Winter  sunshine,  filtering  in  through  cream-colored  curtains, 
touched  upon  those  refinements  with  which  the  prosperous  civil 
ize  and  decorate  the  brutal  need  :  upon  silver,  growing  flowers, 
glittering  glass,  agreeable  open  spaces,  and  fine  old  mahogany. 
It  was  an  exceptionally  pleasant  room.  The  Heths  might  be 
"improbable  people,"  as  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page  was  known  to  have 
said  on  a  certain  occasion  and  gone  unrebuked,  but  their  ma 
terial  taste  was  clearly  above  reproach.  And  all  this  was  to 
their  credit,  proving  efficiency  in  the  supreme  art,  that  of  living. 
For  the  Heths,  of  course,  were  not  rich  at  all  as  the  word  means 
nowadays :  they  were  far  indeed  from  being  the  richest  people 
in  that  town.  Their  merit  it  was  that  they  spent  all  they  had, 
and  sometimes  a  little  more;  and  few  persons  lived  who  could 
surpass  Mrs.  Heth  in  getting  a  dollar's  worth  of  results  for  each 
dollar  expended.  .  .  . 

Carlisle  and  her  father  chatted  pleasantly  about  the  remark 
able  spirit  of  the  poor,  and  the  world's  maudlin  sentiment 
towards  it  and  them.  The  lovely  maid  professed  herself  com 
pletely  puzzled  by  these  problems. 

"We're  always  giving  them  money,"  she  pointed  out,  spoon 
ing  a  light  dessert  in  a  tall  glass,  "or  getting  up  bazaars  for  them, 
or  sending  them  clothes  that  have  lots  more  wear  in  them.  And 
what  do  they  do  in  return,  besides  grumble  and  riot  and  strike 
and  always  ask  for  more?  And  they  stay  poor  just  the  same. 
What  is  going  to  happen,  papa?  " 

67 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

Mr.  Heth  lit  a  cigar  —  not  one  of  the  famous  Heth  Planta 
tion  Cheroots.  He  requested  Cally  not  to  ask  him. 

"Never  be  satisfied,"  said  he,  "till  they  strip  us  of  everything 
we  Ve  worked  our  lives  away  earning.  They  '11  ride  in  our  motor 
cars  and  we'll  sit  in  their  workhouse.  That'll  be  nice,  won't 
it?  How '11  plain  little  girls  like  that,  eh?  " 

She  was  the  apple  of  papa's  eye;  and  she  rather  enjoyed  hear 
ing  him  talk  of  his  manifold  business  activities,  which  was  a 
thing  he  was  not  too  often  encouraged  to  do.  To-day  the 
master  of  the  Works  was  annoyed  into  speech  by  recent  nag 
ging  :  not  merely  from  the  Commissioner  of  Labor,  but  from  the 
Building  Inspector,  who  had  informally  stopped  him  on  the 
street  that  morning.  .  .  . 

"Don't  you  think,  papa,"  Carlisle  said  sweetly,  "that  it  will 
all  end  in  something  like  the  French  Revolution?" 

Mr.  Heth  thought  it  extremely  likely. 

"  Well,"  said  he,  "  I  shan't  be  bothered  by  their  college  f olderol. 
O'Neill 's  easy  enough  managed.  All  I  need  to  do  is  invite  him 
and  Missus  O.  to  dinner." 

"Who  's  O'Neill?"  demanded  Mrs.  Heth,  gliding  in. 

For  the  second  time  during  the  meal,  she  had  been  absent 
from  the  table,  on  a  telephone  call.  She  always  answered  these 
summonses  personally,  regardless  of  when  they  came,  appearing 
to  fear  that  otherwise  she  might  miss  something. 

"And  who,"  she  added,  "is  going  to  invite  him  to  dinner?" 

Mr.  Heth  explained,  and  said  that  nobody  was.  He  'd  only 
mentioned  the  possibility  if  the  fellow  ever  got  troublesome, 
which  was  most  unlikely.  His  wife  was  a  climber  —  social  bug, 
you  know.  "  Pays  to  know  your  man,  eh,  Cally?  .  .  ." 

"I  should  say!  And  O'Neill's  wife  manages  him?" 

"Don't  they  always?"  said  he,  pinching  her  little  pink  ear. 
And  thereupon  he  bethought  himself  of  a  thoroughly  characteris 
tic  quotation,  which  he  rendered  right  jovially: 

" '  Pins  and  needles,  pins  and  needles, 

When  a  man  marries,  his  trouble  begins,' 

"  As  the  fellow  says,"  concluded  Mr.  Heth;  and  so  departed 

68 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


for  The  Fourth  National  Bank.  Mrs.  Heth,  reminding  her  daugh 
ter  about  being  fresh  for  the  afternoon,  glided  to  her  writing- 
desk  in  the  library.  Carlisle  confronted  three  hours  of  leisure 
before  the  prospective  Great  Remeeting.  She  went  to  the  tele 
phone,  and  called  up  her  second-best  girl-friend,  Evelyn  McVey. 
It  developed  that  she  had  nothing  special  to  say  to  Evey,  or  Evey 
to  her.  However,  they  talked  vivaciously  for  twenty  minutes, 
while  operators  reported  both  lines  "busy"  and  distant  people 
were  annoyed  and  skeptical. 

That  done,  Carlisle  went  to  the  upstairs  sitting-room,  and  sat 
by  the  fire  reading  a  Christmas  magazine,  which  had  come  out 
on  Guy  Fawkes  day,  the  5th  of  November.  Presently  she  slipped 
off  her  pumps  the  better  to  enjoy  the  heat:  and  assuredly  there 
is  nothing  surprising  in  that.  It  is  moral  certainty  that  Queens 
and  Empresses  (if  we  knew  all)  dearly  love  to  sit  in  their  stock 
ing-feet  at  times,  and  frequently  do  so  when  certain  that  the 
princesses-in-waiting  and  lady  companions  of  the  bath  are  not 
looking.  The  telephone  interrupted  Carlisle  twice,  but  she  toasted 
her  arched  and  silken  little  insteps  well,  read  three  stories,  and 
thought  that  one  of  them  was  quite  sweet.  Where  she  got  her 
hands  and  feet  she  often  wondered.  They  were  so  clearly  neither 
Heth  nor  Thompson.  By  this  time  her  unwearied  mother  had 
gone  out  to  "  get  in  "  three  or  four  calls;  also  an  important  Chari 
ties  engagement  at  Mrs.  Byrd's,  where  Carlisle  was  to  call  for  her 
in  the  car  at  five  o'clock  sharp,  for  their  visit  to  the  Bellingham. 
Carlisle  now  became  conscious  of  a  void,  and  ate  five  chocolates 
from  a  large  adjacent  box  of  them,  the  gift  of  J.  Forsythe  Avery. 
Then  she  yawned  delicately,  and  picked  up  "  Sonnets  from  the 
Portuguese"  (by  Mrs.  Browning);  for  she,  it  must  be  remem 
bered,  had  a  well-rounded  ideal,  and  believed  that  it  was  your 
duty  to  cultivate  your  mind.  Life  is  n't  all  parties  and  beaux, 
as  she  sometimes  remarked  to  Mattie  Allen.  .  .  . 

There  came  a  knock  upon  the  door,  breaking  the  thread 
of  culture.  The  seneschal  Moses  entered,  announcing  callers, 
ladies,  in  the  drawing-room.  Carlisle  sighed;  recalled  herself  to 
actuality.  After  glancing  at  the  cards,  she  conceded  the  injudi- 
ciousness  of  saying  that  she  was  out,  and  told  Moses  to  announce 

69 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


that  she  would  be  down  in  a  moment.  She  kept  the  callers  wait 
ing  twenty  moments,  however,  while,  in  her  own  room,  she 
made  ready  for  the  street.  She  was  donning  a  hat  which  in  shape 
and  size  was  not  unlike  a  man's  derby;  it  was  of  black  velvet, 
lined  under  the  brim  with  old-blue,  and  edged  with  a  piping  of 
dark-brown  fur.  At  a  certain  point  in  or  on  it,  there  stuck  up  two 
stiff  straight  blue  plumes.  The  hat  was  simply  absurd,  wildly 
laughable  and  ridiculous,  up  to  the  moment  when  she  got  it  on ; 
then  it  was  seen  that  it  had  a  certain  merit  after  all.  It  was  a 
calling-costume  (as  one  believes)  that  Carlisle  assumed  for  the 
Bellingham;  a  blue  costume,  of  a  soft  material  which  had  been 
invented  only  about  a  month  before,  and  which  was  silk  or  satin, 
according  as  you  looked  at  it,  but  certainly  did  not  shine  much. 
The  coat,  or  jacket  or  wrap,  which  completed  the  suit  was  ar 
resting  in  design,  to  say  no  more  of  it.  Less  original  were  the 
muff  and  stole  of  darkest  sable;  but  they  were  beautiful. 

Carlisle,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  went  downstairs  in  her  hat. 
"Oh,"  the  visiting  ladies  would  say,  "but  you  are  going  out." 
"  Oh,  not  for  half  an  hour  yet,"  she  would  protest.  "  I  Jm  so  glad 
you  came." 

About  4.30,  J.  Forsythe  Avery,  who  had  no  office  hours,  was 
ushered  into  the  stately  Heth  drawing-room.  The  lady  callers 
withdrew  promptly,  but  not  so  promptly  as  to  make  it  too 
pointed.  It  was  generally  believed  at  this  time  that  Miss  Heth 
"had  an  understanding"  with  Mr.  Avery,  though  it  was  quite 
well  known  that  she,  personally,  much  preferred  young  Robert 
Tellford.  The  figure,  however,  at  which  a  famous  life  insurance 
company  commanded  Robert's  undivided  services  made  him  a 
purely  academic  interest.  With  J.  Forsythe  the  case  was  totally 
different:  from  the  environs  of  his  native  Mauch  Chunk  the 
Avery  forbears  had  dug  principal  and  interest  in  enormous  quan 
tities. 

J.  Forsythe  remained  for  twenty  minutes,  the  period  named 
when  he  had  telephoned.  Having  failed  to  secure  any  extension 
of  time,  he  went  away,  and  Carlisle  skipped  upstairs  to  look  in 
the  mirror,  and  put  on  the  concluding  touches  indicated  above. 
Descending  and  emerging  into  the  winter  sunset,  she  sent  the 

7P 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


waiting  car  on  ahead  to  the  Byrds',  and  set  out  to  do  the  five 
blocks  afoot.  Exercise  makes  pink  cheeks. 

It  was  a  splendid  afternoon,  sharp  and  clear  as  a  silver  bell. 
Carlisle  walked  well,  especially  when  one  considers  the  sort  of 
shoes  she  wore :  she  had  the  good  free  stride  of  one  who  walks  for 
the  joy  of  it  and  not  because  that  is  the  only  conceivable  way  to 
get  somewhere.  Nevertheless,  just  as  she  reached  the  Byrd  door- 
Step,  she  was  overhauled  by  the  Cooneys,  her  poor  but  long-step 
ping  relatives.  There  were  only  two  of  them  this  time,  Henri 
etta  and  Charles,  better  known,  from  one  end  of  the  town  to  the 
other,  as  Hen  and  Chas. 

The  Cooneys,  who  were  young  people  of  about  her  own 
age,  greeted  Carlisle  with  their  customary  simple  gaiety.  Both 
exclaimed  over  her  striking  attire,  Charles  adding  to  his 
sister: 

"Let  Uncle  Dudley  stand  next  to  Cally  there,  Hen  —  I'm 
better-looking  than  you,  anyway." 

"I'd  like  to  see  a  vote  on  that  first.  Recognize  mine,  Cally?" 
cried  Hen  —  "  the  brown  you  gave  me  last  fall?  First  appearance 
since  I  steamed  and  turned  it.  It  '11  stand  a  dye  next  year,  too. 
But  we  have  n't  seen  you  for  a  long  time,  my  dear.  Did  you 
know  Aunt  Rose  Hopwood's  staying  with  us  now?" 

"Oh,  is  she?  I  had  n't  heard,  Hen.  How  is  she?" 

"She's  bad  off,"  said  Chas,  cheerfully.  "Deaf,  lame,  and 
cruel  poverty's  hit  her  right  at  her  old  home  address.  I  guess 
she'll  come  live  with  us  later  on.  Come  walk  out  to  King's 
Bridge  for  an  appetite." 

Carlisle,  with  an  impatient  foot  on  the  Byrds'  bottom  step, 
glanced  from  Chas  to  Hen,  smiling  a  little.  Her  cousins  were  well- 
meaning  young  people,  and  she  liked  them  in  a  way,  but  she 
often  found  their  breezy  assurance  somewhat  amusing. 

"Thank  you,  Chas,"  said  she,  "but  I've  an  engagement  with 
mamma.  I  'm  to  pick  her  up  here  now.  I  hope  Aunt  Molly 's 
well?" 

"Fine,"  said  Hen.  "Come  and  see  us,  Cally.  Why  don't 
you  come  to  supper  to-morrow  night  ?  " 

The  lovely  cousin  obviously  hesitated. 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Aw,  Cally  doesn't  want  to  come  yell  in  Aunt  Rose  Hop- 
wood's  trumpet,  Hen  — " 

"Aunt  Rose  Hop  wood's  going  home  to-morrow." 

"  First  I  've  heard  of  it.  Frankly  I  doubt  your  word." 

For  that  Hen  idly  smote  Chas's  shins  with  her  silver-handled 
umbrella  (Carlisle's  gift  three  Christmases  before),  at  which 
Chas  cried  ouch  in  such  a  manner  as  to  attract  the  attention  of 
bystanders.  Henrietta  liked  this  umbrella  very  much  and  com 
monly  carried  it,  like  a  cane,  through  all  droughts. 

"But,"  said  she,  reconsidering,  "IthinkHortense  '11  be  off  to 
morrow,  that 's  so.  Well,  come  the  first  soon  night  you  feel  like 
it—" 

Carlisle  had  been  doing  some  considering  also,  her  conscience 
pricking  her  on  account  of  the  cousinly  duty,  long  overdue. 

"I've  an  engagement  to-morrow  —  so  sorry,"  she  said,  rather 
hastily.  "But  how  about  one  night  early  next  week,  say  — 
Thursday,  if  that  would  suit  — ?" 

Chas  and  Hen  agreed  that  it  would  do  perfectly.  Pot-luck  at 
seven.  Sorry  she  would  n't  walk  on  with  them.  Bully  day  for 
Shanks's  mares.  And  so  forth.  .  .  . 

Carlisle,  an  eye-catching  figure  in  her  calling  costume  (as 
suming  that  this  is  what  it  was)  glanced  after  her  poor  relations 
from  the  Byrds'  vestibule,  and  was  amused  by  her  thought. 
How  exactly  like  the  Cooneys'  lively  cheek  (and  nobody  else 's) 
to  propose  a  country  walk  with  them  as  a  perfectly  satisfactory 
substitute  for  an  hour's  tete-ti-tdte  with  Hugo  Canning! 


VII 


How  the  Great  Parti,  pursued  or  pursuing  to  Cousin  Willie  Kerr's 
apartment,  begins  thundering  again. 

BELLINGHAM  COURT  was  the  very  newest  of  those 
metropolitan-looking  apartment  hotels  which  the  rapid 
growth  and  complicating  "standards"  of  the  city  was 
then  calling  into  being.  It  was  on  the  most  fashionable  street, 
Washington,  in  one  of  the  most  fashionable  parts  of  it.  And  it 
had  bell-boys,  onyxine  vestibules,  and  hot  and  cold  water  in 
nearly  every  room. 

It  also  had  a  fat  black  hall-porter  in  a  conductor's  uniform, 
and  this  functionary  informed  Mrs.  Heth  that  Mr.  Kerr  was 
momentarily  detained  at  the  bank,  but  had  telephoned  orders 
that  any  callers  he  might  have  were  to  be  shown  right  up.  The 
Heth  ladies  were  shown  right  up. 

Willie's  new  apartment  consisted  of  a  sitting-room,  a  fair-sized 
bedroom,  and  a  very  small  bath.  About  the  sitting-room  the 
ladies  wandered,  glancing  disinterestedly  at  the  Kerr  Penates. 
Presently  Mrs.  Heth  opened  doors  and  peeped  into  what  lay 
beyond. 

"It's  a  good  thing  he's  small,"  said  she.  "H'm,  that  thing 
looks  like  a  foot-tub." 

Carlisle,  looking  over  her  mother's  shoulder,  laughed.  "You 
could  n't  splash  about  much.  .  .  .  You  shave  at  that,  I  sup 
pose." 

"I  don't.  One  shaves.  There  's  a  better  apartment  he  could 
have  got  for  the  same  price,  but  manlike  he  did  n't  find  it  out  till 
too  late.  What's  this  —  bedroom?  .  .  .  Yes,  there's  the  bed." 

They  stepped  back  into  the  sitting-room,  and  Carlisle,  stroll 
ing  aimlessly  about,  became  a  little  silent  and  distrait. 

It  is  possibly  true,  as  crusty  single-men  affirm,  that  a  certain 

73 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

solacing  faculty  inheres  in  beautiful  ladies:  the  faculty,  namely, 
of  explaining  all  apparently  unwelcome  situations  upon  theories 
quite  flattering  to  themselves.  But  Carlisle  surely  needed  no 
such  make-believe  in  this  moment  of  rather  excited  expectancy. 

Of  course  she  knew  well  enough  what  inferences  Evey  and  Mat- 
tie,  for  instance  (in  both  of  whom  there  was  a  certain  amount  of 
the  cat),  would  have  drawn  from  the  fact  that  Mr.  Canning,  last 
month,  had  not  seemed  to  follow  up  in  any  way  their  very  inter 
esting  meeting  at  the  Beach.  She  alone  knew  the  real  circum 
stances,  however,  and  it  had  become  quite  clear  to  her  that  Mr. 
Canning's  demeanor  was  only  what  was  to  be  expected.  He  was 
the  proudest  of  men,  and  (that  awful  night  at  the  Beach)  she 
had  expelled  him  from  her  presence  like  a  schoolboy.  Naturally 
he  had  been  annoyed  and  offended  —  stung  even  into  the  rude 
ness  of  abandoning  her  in  a  summer-house  to  an  entire  stranger. 
How  could  you  possibly  wonder  (unless  feline)  that  he,  great  un 
social  at  best,  had  thereafter  remained  silent  inside  his  fort?  .  .  . 

"How  like  a  man,"  breathed  Mrs.  Heth,  glancing  at  her 
watch,  "to  pick  out  this  day  of  all  others  to  be  detained  at  a 
bank." 

She  had  sat  down  in  one  of  the  bachelor  chairs,  to  take  her 
weight  from  her  feet,  which  hurt  her  by  reason  of  new  shoes  half  a 
size  too  small.  The  sitting-room  was  pleasant  enough  in  a  strictly 
orthodox  fashion,  and  was  illuminated  by  an  electric-lamp  on  the 
black  centre-table.  Mrs.  Heth,  who  had  helped  Willie  with  his 
furnishings,  had  considered  it  the  prettiest  electrolier  that  four 
teen  dollars  would  buy  in  the  town  during  the  week  before  last. 
Carlisle  had  come  to  a  halt  before  the  bookcase.  It  was  a  mis 
sion-oak  case,  with  leaded  glass  doors.  For  the  moment  it  might 
be  said  to  represent  rather  the  aspirations  of  a  bibliophile  than 
their  fulfilment,  since  it  contained  but  seven  books,  huddled 
together  on  the  next-to-the-top  shelf.  Carlisle  swung  open  the 
door,  and  examined  the  Kerr  library  title  by  title:  "Ben  Hur," 
"The  Little  Minister,"  "Law's  Serious  Call  to  a  Devout  and 
Holy  Life"  (from  his  loving  Grandma  —  Xmas  1904),  "Droll 
Tales,"  "Religio  Medici"  (Grandma  again  —  Xmas  1907)," 
"The  Cynic's  Book  of  Girls" 

74 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

Carlisle  laughed  merrily.  "Willie  has  two  copies  of  'The 
Cynic's  Book  of  Girls. '  .  .  .  I  'd  never  thought  of  him  as  a 
divil  with  the  women  somehow." 

"He  could  never  get  Helen  Tellford  to  look  at  him." 

" '  Religio  Medici. '  Is  it  religious  or  medical?  It  might  be 
either,  by  my  Latin." 

"One  of  those  faith-healing  things,  I  suppose.  Emmanuel 
Movement.  I  'd  sit  down  if  I  were  you.  ...  Ah!  There's 
Willie  at  last.  Mind,  Carlisle,  —  don't  you  hear  the  steps?" 

"Well,  we're  invited  to  look  at  his  things  —  are  n't  — " 

Her  careless  voice  died,  as  both  together  became  aware  that 
these  could  not  possibly  be  the  steps  of  a  proprietor.  The  ap 
proaching  feet  halted  decorously  without,  and  instead  of  the 
door 's  bursting  open  there  came  only  a  manly  knock  upon  it.  Car 
lisle  looked  at  her  mother,  and  found  that  her  mother  was  look 
ing  at  her  with  quite  a  tense  expression.  This  certainly  was  not 
the  way  they  had  wanted  things  to  happen.  .  .  . 

"Possibly  it's  only  a  tradesman,"  murmured  Mrs.  Heth,  with 
hope;  and  she  added  in  a  commanding  voice:  "Come  in." 

The  door  opened,  with  a  certain  stately  dubiousness.  Full  on 
the  threshold  stood  Mr.  Hugo  Canning,  no  less:  an  impressive 
presence  in  loose  motor-coat  of  black  fur.  Mr.  Canning  stood 
agaze;  it  was  to  be  seen  that  he  was  taken  considerably  by  sur 
prise. 

For  the  smallest  known  fraction  of  a  second,  the  tableau  held. 
Then  action  began,  dashingly. 

"Why,  Mr.  Canning!"  cried  Mrs.  Heth,  heartily,  rising. 
"What  a  very  pleasant  surprise!  So  you're  back  with  us  again? 
Delightful!"' 

Mr.  Canning  came  forward;  he  bowed  with  fine  civility  over 
the  proffered  hand,  voicing  great  pleasure  in  this  remeeting. 
And  then  his  eye  went  flitting,  with  a  certain  interrogativeness, 
from  mother  to  daughter. 

"Such  an  agreeable  coincidence,"  beamed  the  good  little  lady. 
"  Or  perhaps  this  is  not  your  first  visit  here,  like  ours?  When  did 
you  return?  Carlisle  .  .  ." 

Carlisle,  having  forgotten  more  about  the  Great  Game  than 

75 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


her  mother  would  ever  know,  was  far  from  effusive.  Advancing 
half  a  step  from  the  bookcase,  and  offering  the  tips  of  white- 
gloved  fingers,  she  said,  smiling  perfunctorily: 

"How  nice  to  see  you.  And  Willie  Kerr,  our  very  delinquent 
host,  —  do  you  bring  us  news  of  him?  " 

"I'm  told  that  he's  unluckily  detained  downtown.  But,  in 
deed,  it 's  charming  to  find  you  awaiting  him  too,  Miss  Heth." 

Mrs.  Heth  sparkled,  and  declaimed  of  Willie's  remissness. 
Canning  stood  in  the  middle  of  the  floor,  hat  and  stick  under  his 
arm,  looking  without  pretences  at  Carlisle.  Under  the  agreeable 
indifference  of  his  seemingly  amused  eye,  she  felt  her  color 
mounting,  which  only  brightened  her  loveliness.  Perhaps  it  was 
not  quite  so  easy  to  maintain  the  reasoning  of  beautiful  ladies 
here  on  the  firing-line,  as  in  the  maidenly  cloister  at  home. 

"Why  are  men  the  unreliable  sex,  Mr.  Canning?"  said  she, 
laughing.  "Here  Willie  begs  us  for  days  to  visit  him  at  his 
rooms  —  I  believe  he  thinks  there  's  something  rather  gay  and 
wicked  about  it,  you  know,  though  mamma  picked  them  out 
for  him!  —  and  assures  us  on  his  honor  as  a  banker  that  he  is  in 
every  afternoon  by  five  at  the  very  latest.  So  we  inconvenience 
ourselves  and  come.  And  now  —  look! " 

"  At  what,  Miss  Heth?  I  trust  nothing  serious  has  happened  ?  " 

"Ah,  but  our  time  is  so  valuable,  you  see.  We  must  leave 
without  even  saying  how-do-you-do.  Don't  you  think  so, 
mamma?  " 

"So  it  seems,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  and  sank  into  a  chair. 

Canning  smiled. 

"Very  pleasant  little  diggings  he  has  here,"  he  observed  casu 
ally  —  "my  first  glimpse  of  them.  I  happened  to  be  corning  in 
town  on  business,  and  Kerr  invited  me  particularly  to  drop  in  to 
see  them,  at  half  after  five  sharp." 

"Really!  How  very  fortunate  we  are!  But,  oh,  why  didn't 
you  come  a  little  earlier  and  charitably  help  us  through  the  wait? 
We've  had  nothing  on  earth  to  do  but  read  and  reread  'The 
Cynic's  Book  of  Girls.'" 

"Had  I  ventured  to  hope  that  you  were  to  be  here,"  said  he, 
with  a  little  bow  —  and  was  there  the  slightest,  most  daring 

76 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


stress  upon  the  pronouns?  —  "you  may  be  sure  I  should  have 
arrived  long  ago." 

Carlisle,  dauntless,  looked  full  at  him  and  laughed  audaciously. 

"I  recall  you  now  as  a  maker  of  the  very  prettiest  speeches. 
And  the  worst  of  it  is  —  /like  them!  .  .  .  Mamma,"  she  added, 
with  fine,  gay  courage,  "it  is  sad  to  go  just  as  the  guests  arrive. 
Yet  don't  you  think,  really  — " 

"I'm  afraid  we  must,  my  dear.  Willie  's  evidently  — " 

But  the  need  for  tactics  was  fortunately  at  an  end.  If  Carlisle 
had  drawn  it  rather  fine,  it  was  yet  not  too  fine.  The  door  flew 
open,  and  in  bounded  Willie.  Destiny  climbed  to  the  wheel  once 
more. 

Willie,  though  heated  with  hurry  and  worry,  handled  the  situa 
tion  loyally  and  well,  expressing  just  the  right  amount  of  sur 
prise  at  the  coincidental  assemblage,  in  just  the  right  places.  Of 
his  detention  at  the  bank  (where,  as  we  may  infer  from  his  long 
incumbency,  he  discharged  a  tellership  to  the  complete  satisfac 
tion  of  the  depositing  public),  he  spoke  in  bitter  detail. 

"If  you'll  excuse  the  French,  ma'am,"  he  summed  up,  "a  man 
might's  well  be  in  hell  as  ten  cents  out." 

"Why,  I  do  think,  Willie,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  "that  rather  than 
take  all  that  trouble,  I  should  simply  have  paid  the  ten  cents 
from  my  own  pocket  and  said  no  more  about  it." 

But  even  Willie,  perfect  host  though  he  was,  did  not  see  his 
way  clear  at  the  moment  to  explaining  the  banking  system  to  a 
lady. 

"You  might  call  it  sporting  pride,  ma'am,"  he  said,  patiently, 
and  proposed  a  little  tour  of  the  rooms. 

The  tour,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  was  a  little  one,  almost  a 
fireside  tour,  and  soon  over.  Willie  simply  did  not  have  the  ma 
terial  to  spin  it  out  indefinitely.  Then  refreshments  were  hospit 
ably  insisted  on :  tea  —  muffins  —  something  of  that  sort,  you 
know  —  and  Willie  cried  down  his  order  through  the  telephone, 
which  had  already  been  duly  admired  —  one  in  every  room,  etc. 
Next  from  a  hidden  cubby  he  produced  siphon-water,  glasses, 
and  a  black  bottle  of  Scotch.  Needed  it,  said  he  —  digging  two 
hours  for  ten  cents  out. 

77 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Like  the  quarters,  hey,  Canning?  Gad,  may  move  again. 
Man  across  the  hall  —  bigger  rooms  —  wants  to  sublet.  Like 
you  to  look  at  'em  sometime,  Cousin  Isabel.  Say,  Cousin  Isabel, 
by  the  bye,"  he  added,  expertly  putting  ice  into  three  glasses, 
"ran  down  that  chap  V.  Vivian  for  you,  just  now.  Fact.  Old 
Sleuth  Kerr  —  catches  'em  alive.  He  's  Armistead  Beirne's 
nephew  —  just  turned  up  here  —  what  d'  you  think  of  that?" 

"Mr.  Beirne's  nephew/"  echoed  Carlisle  Heth,  without  the 
slightest  strategy. 

"Vivian?  Who  on  earth,  Willie?"  demanded  Mrs.  Heth,  puz 
zled;  and  looked,  not  at  Willie,  but  at  Carlisle. 

"  Don't  you  remember?  —  chap  that  wrote  that  fierce  slush 
attackin'  the  Works,  month  or  so  ago?  That's  the  bird. — 
Got  rye  right  here,  if  you  prefer  it,  Canning.  —  Walked  a  block 
with  him  and  old  Beirne  just  now.  Remember  Amy  Beirne  — 
eloped  with  some  inventor  fellow  —  what 's  his  name  —  oh,  sure, 
Vivian,  haha!  Lived  in  Alabama.  Here  's  regards." 

Mrs.  Heth  now  recalled  the  name,  and  also  having  asked 
Willie,  long  since,  to  identify  it.  However,  she  thought  the  topic 
just  a  little  inopportune  at  the  moment. 

"Ah,  yes.  Mr.  Beirne's  nephew — well!  I  hope  you  made  this 
very  mild,  indeed,  Willie?  You  know  I  rarely  consent  to  .  .  . 
He  might  be  better  employed,  one  would  think,  than  vilifying  the 
Works,  but  there 's  no  accounting  for  tastes,  as  I  always  say." 

"Just  water  with  a  dash,  ma'am.  Oh,  he's  one  of  these  slum 
ming  chaps,  seems  —  kind  of  a  Socialist,  y'  know  — " 

"The Works? "queried Mr.  Canning.  "Ah, yes!  Mr.Heth's  — 
of  course!  Is  a  cigarette  permitted?  ..." 

Carlisle,  who  had  been  gazing  into  the  fire  and  acquiring  infor 
mation,  roused.  "  Oh,  here 's  your  tea,  Willie! "  said  she.  "  How 
very  good  it  looks!  " 

Unlike  mamma,  she  did  not  in  the  least  mind  Mr.  Canning's 
hearing  mention  of  the  Works,  even  under  attack.  Shame  at 
trade  was  not  in  her:  she  was  confidently  proud  of  the  great 
mute  author  of  her  brilliant  being.  And  it  was  by  this  pride, 
dating  back  many  years  and  untouched  by  any  late  personal 
impression,  that  no  "attack"  could  gain  standing  in  her  mind. 

78 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

At  seven,  she  had  one  day  asked  her  father,  "  Papa,  what  are 
the  Works?"  —  and  papa  had  smiled  and  answered,  "It's  the 
place  where  all  our  money  comes  from."  To  this  day,  her  mind's 
eye  called  up  a  great  white  marble  palace,  something  like  the 
New  York  Public  Library,  only  bigger,  from  the  front  of  which, 
through  an  enormous  cornucopia,  poured  a  ceaseless  flood  of 
golden  dollars.  .  .  . 

"I've  no  patience  with  Socialism,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  rising. 
"Where  do  you  want  your  things  put,  Willie?  Divide  all  our 
property  up  equally  with  the  lazy  and  drunken  classes,  to-day, 
and  by  to-morrow  the  hard-working,  well-to-do  people  would 
have  won  every  bit  of  it  back  again.  I'm  surprised  everybody 
can't  see  that,  are  n't  you,  Mr.  Canning?" 

"I  'm  astonished  at  their  blindness,"  said  Canning,  gazing  at 
the  floor.  "Vivian  is  clearly  off  his  chump  at  all  points." 

"That's  right  —  screw  loose,"  said  Willie,  genially.  "Set  'em 
here,  boy.  From  the  feller's  literary  style,  I'd  expected  a  regular 
riproarin'  fire-eater.  Gad,  no!  Face  like  a  child's,  kinder  cute- 
lookin' !  Fact.  Polite  as  peaches.  You  pour,  Carlisle,  will  you?  " 

The  folding-table  was  set.  The  tea-things  were  tenderly  ar 
ranged  upon  it  by  the  dusky  waiter.  The  little  company  moved 
and  shifted.  Host  Kerr  surveyed  the  pleasant  scene  with  no 
little  secret  pride  of  proprietorship.  His  room  —  his  tea  the 
ripping-looking  girl  was  serving  on  his  patent  table  —  his  hire 
ling  just  backing  out  of  the  door  .  .  .  However,  his  also  was  the 
manifest  duty  in  the  premises;  and,  bestirring  himself,  he  fetched 
tea  and  cakes  for  Mrs.  Heth  and  invited  her  to  sit  with  him  be 
side  the  mission-oak  bookcase. 

Canning  had  dropped  into  a  chair  near  the  fireplace,  one  yard 
from  the  tea-table.  He  wore  without  concealment  the  air  of 
waiting  to  be  entertained.  Carlisle  poured,  and  thought  that  in 
ten  minutes,  or  at  most  fifteen,  this  would  be  all  over:  if  the  pre 
sent  tete-&-tete  was  to  lead  to  another,  and  so  on  through  a  gor 
geous  climacteric  sequence,  it  was  now,  or  it  was  never.  Here  was 
an  exciting  thought,  with  stage-fright  possibilities  to  some;  but 
Carlisle,  confident  through  her  many  testimonials,  merely  smiled 
prettily  and  asked  Mr.  Canning  if  he  would  not  take  one  or  more 

79 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

of  the  cunning  little  pink  cakes.  It  appeared  that  Mr.  Canning 
would;  pink,  he  said,  was  his  color. 

"I  believe  we  parted  rather  suddenly,"  said  Carlisle,  continu 
ing  to  smile  a  little  to  herself,  "the  last  time  I  had  this  pleasure. 
Do  you  remember?  " 

He  desired  to  know  if  she  could  possibly  conceive  his  memory 
to  be  so  short. 

"I  was  immensely  mortified,"  said  she,  "to  learn  that  I  had 
given  you  a  cold  —  it  was  a  cold,  was  n't  it?  —  or  whooping- 
cough?  —  by  keeping  you  so  long  in  the  night  air  that  evening. 
I  Ve  worried  so  about  it  all  these  weeks.  Am  I  too  late  to  in 
quire?" 

"I  kick  myself  to  have  gone  away  leaving  you  anxious,"  said 
Canning,  with  entire  gravity.  "The  attack,  as  it  chanced,  was 
transitory.  There  was  no  coughing  —  whooping  or  otherwise. 
The  trouble  was  purely  localized,  in  the  head,  and  — " 

"In  the  imagination,  might  one  almost  say?" 

"In  the  head.  You  must  have  heard  somewhere  of  cold  in  the 
head?  A  well-known  though  unfashionable  complaint,  through 
out  the  north.  I,  on  the  other  hand,  was  much  troubled  about 
you,  whom  I  was  compelled,  by  your  command,  to  leave  to  the 
mercies  of  the  nocturnal  caller.  However,  Kerr  assured  me,  be 
fore  I  was  obliged  to  go  away,  that  you  had  come  through  alive 
and  uninjured." 

"Ah,  but  did  I?".  .  .  She  added,  after  a  brief  pause:  "Should 
you  call  a  biting  lecture  on  one's  shortcomings  from  a  strange 
man  no  injury?" 

"But  surely,  speaking  to  that  topic  alone,  my  supplanter 
could  not  have  spun  it  out  for  two  hours,  while  I,  luckless  one, 
tramped  alone  on  the  piazza." 

"Two  hours?  .  .  .  As  I  say,"  Carlisle  laughed  at  him,  nibbling 
a  little  pink  cake,  "I  like  your  pretty  speeches." 

The  fire  crackled  merrily.  The  masculine  paraphernalia  stood 
convenient.  Canning  stretched  out  an  indolent  but  man's  sized 
hand  and  refilled  his  glass.  From  across  the  room  Kerr's  voice 
sounded,  conveying  enthusiasm  founded  on  the  solid  rock  of 
patience: 

80 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"And  this  little  poem  about  roses  and  how  cold  your  nose  is  — 
I  must  really  show  you  that,  ma'am.  Spicy ,  you  know !  And  the 
witty  picture!" 

"I'll  compromise  on  an  hour,"  said  Canning.  "And what  hid 
eous  foibles  did  the  visitor  charge  you  with  to  banish  me  that 
long?" 

"With  being  quite  heartless." 

"Oh." 

"  With  having  nothing  inside  to  be  kind  with.  For  these  rea 
sons  he  felt  quite  sorry  for  me." 

"Ah!  Is  it  possible  that  you  could  remember  my  suggesting, 
just  a  thought  before  him  — " 

"  I  do  remember.  But,  you  see,  this  man  is  quite  crazy.  I  sus 
pected  it  then,  but  I  know  it  now,  for  you  said  so  not  five  min 
utes  ago." 

Canning  looked  at  her. 

"Your  words,"  said  Carlisle,  "were  that  he  was  off  his  chump 
at  all  points.  I  hope  mamma  is  n't  listening,  for  she  does  n't  like 
me  to  use  slang,  and  will  not  believe  me  when  I  say  the  men  teach 
it  to  me." 

"Oh!  ...  Was  that  Vivian!" 

Carlisle  nodded.  "It  makes  it  all  quite  interesting,  doesn't  it? 
To  be  felt  sorry  for  by  a  man  who  writes  really  wicked  attacks  on 
one's  father's  perfectly  lovely  business.  Only  I  knew  all  along  he 
wasn't  really  quite  right.  ...  I  hope  you  've  had  a  very  happy 
trip?" 

"Thank  you.  I  don't  believe  I  have,  particularly." 

"Oh,  I'm  sorry!  .  .  .  Have  you  suffered  at  all  from  the  blues, 
since  you  got  well  of  the  cold  and  escaped  at  midnight  from 
your  little  fort?" 

Canning  continued  to  look  at  her. 

"I  've  felt  lonely,"  said  he,  "when  the  moon  shines  bright." 

"You?" 

A  knock  fell  upon  the  door,  making  all  look  up;  and  Ken- 
bustling  forward,  first  opened  the  door,  and  then  stepped  out 
into  the  hall.  He  returned  in  a  moment,  his  round  face  puckered 
dubiously. 

81 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"It's  Johnson,"  he  explained  — " chap  across  the  hall,  with 
the  better  apartment.  Wanted  to  show  it  to  me  now.  He 's  liv 
ing  down  the  river,  and's  going  off  in  half  an  hour.  H'm.  Well, 
guess  I  better  let  it  go  till  the  next  time  he's  in." 

"Don't  mind  us,  old  chap,"  said  Canning,  without  hesitation. 

"If  you  wanted  mamma  to  look  at  it  with  you,  Willie?  Per 
haps—" 

Mrs.  Heth  was  already  on  her  feet. 

"Nonsense,  Willie!  Of  course  get  the  man  while  he's  here  — 
and  I'm  here  too!  Across  the  hall?  —  it  won't  take  us  five  min 
utes—" 

"All  right 'm  —  thank  you,"  agreed  Willie,  with  evident 
pleasure.  He  added,  smiling  roguishly:  "You  two  be  trusted 
five  minutes  without  a  chaperon?" 

Carlisle  laughed  dazzlingly. 

"Five  years,  Willie.  Mr.  Canning  is  absolutely  safe." 

Mrs.  Heth,  saying  archly  that  they  would  not  absent  them 
selves  quite  so  long  as  that,  glided  out.  Willie  followed,  engrossed 
in  Johnson.  The  door  was  left  half  open.  Johnson  was  presented. 
Their  voices  died  away  across  and  down  the  hall.  .  .  . 

A  momentary  silence  fell  upon  Mr.  Canning  and  Carlisle,  thus 
deserted  in  the  Kerr  sitting-room.  It  appeared  to  embarrass 
neither.  Having  risen,  Canning  stood  at  the  mantel,  sipping  his 
Scotch  and  looking  down  at  her.  Carlisle  went  on  cutting  bread 
and  butter,  or  something  of  that  sort.  She  felt  agreeably  excited. 
In  the  manner  of  the  shining  passer-by  she  had  observed  just 
that  progressiveness  noted  on  the  occasion  of  their  two  other 
meetings:  faintly  ironic  boredom  yielding  slowly  to  passive  in 
terest,  passive  interest  warming  steadily.  .  .  . 

She  had  taken  off  her  coat,  at  Kerr's  solicitation;  she  sat  with 
lowered  lashes,  the  glow  of  the  fire  upon  her  cheek.  To  what  mea 
sure  she  engaged  and  intrigued  the  eye,  Mr.  Canning  had  had 
seven  weeks  to  forget.  No  dull  wit,  we  may  suppose,  in  apprecia 
tion  of  feminine  masterpieces,  he  seemed  to  see  it  suddenly  with 
some  force  now,  standing  and  sipping  the  pleasurable  Scotch. 
And  he  began  to  speak  in  a  voice  not  previously  heard  in  Kerr's 
apartment. 

82 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"  Lonely,  Miss  Heth,  when  the  moon  shines  bright  —  blue, 
too,  now  that  I  think  of  it.  —  You  are  good  enough  to  ask  if 
I  Ve  had  a  happy  trip.  Happy!  .  .  .  Weeks  of  moping  from  dull 
place  to  duller,  months  ditto  staring  one  in  the  face,  and  for  this 
present  —  the  rural  villa  of  one's  estimable  cousins,  with  the  sun 
and  the  stars  for  company.  Really  does  it  seem  such  a  trifle  to 
you  to  be  plucked  up  by  the  ears  from  one's  environment,  trans 
planted  bodily  league  on  league,  and  set  down  on  an  empty  road 
four  miles  from  nowhere?" 

"Nowhere?  You  are  cruel,  Mr.  Canning.  Four  miles  trav 
elled  in  the  right  direction  might  bring  you  to  a  good  deal.  Only 
mountains  never  really  come  to  Mahomets,  not  in  life." 

"Ah,  but  I'm  no  Mahomet  in  these  months,  alas!  to  scale 
mountains  or  not  as  the  whim  strikes  me.  If  I  were!  .  .  .But 
no,  no! — my  sentence,  you  see,  is  expressly  to  avoid  all  moun 
tain-climbing  with  whatever  else  is  pleasant  —  to  play  the 
invalid,  to  rest,  breathe  deep,  sleep  and  coddle.  And  for  excite 
ment  —  it  is  my  revered  mother's  own  suggestion  —  why',  write 
a  book  if  I  like  —  my  impressions  of  the  New  South,  or  any  other 
reason  why!  Write  a  book!  What  have  I  to  do  with  writing, 
think  I,  of  a  long  morning  or  a  longer  night!  I'm  no  scrivening 
professor,  but  blood  and  flesh.  .  .  .  You  could  n't  imagine  the 
number  of  times  I  Ve  been  tempted  to  chuck  all  the  mild  climate 
tomfoolery,  and  cut  away  for  lights  and  home! " 

Carlisle  gazed  up  at  him,  her  chin  upon  her  ungloved  hand. 
Was  there  pose  in  these  depictions  of  Mr.  Hugo  Canning  as  a 
morose  recluse?  She  thought  not:  his  light  bitterness  rang  true 
enough,  the  note  of  a  man  really  half-desperate  with  ennui. 
And  she  read  his  remarks  as  a  subtle  sign  of  his  confidence,  an 
acknowledgment  of  acquaintance  between  them,  a  bond.  .  .  . 

"But  you  can't  do  it,  I  suppose?  —  if  your  health  demands 
that  you  put  up  with  us  a  little  while  longer?" 

"  I  seem  rude?  —  of  course.  But  my  meaning  is  quite  the  con 
trary.  .  .  .  May  you,  Miss  Heth,  never  know  the  sorrows  of 
the  transplanted  and  the  idle  — " 

He  broke  off,  staring  with  apparent  absentness. 

Much  interested,  Carlisle  said,  toying  with  her  teaspoon: 

83   " 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"I  did  n't  think  you  rude  at  all.  It  seems  to  me  perfectly 
natural  that  you  should  be  both  bored  and  blue  —  especially  if 
you  don't  feel  quite  well.  .  .  .  But  surely  a  little  mild  pleasuring 
during  rest  hours  is  n't  forbidden  as  injurious  to  throats?" 

"A  little?" 

"Of  course  you  think  we  haven't  much  to  offer,  but  really 
there  is  some  amusement  to  be  had  here.  Really!  Perhaps  a 
little  gambolling  now  and  then  — " 

"My  curse,"  said  Canning,  turning  his  dark  eyes  down  upon 
her,  "  is  that  I  can't  learn  when  to  stop.  Once  I  begin,  I  am  never 
satisfied  till  I  Ve  gambolled  all  over  the  place." 

Carlisle's  eyes  fell  before  his  gaze.  "This,"  said  she,  draw 
ing  on  a  glove,  "is  a  small  place." 

"You  appear  to  invite  me  to  gambol?" 

"I?  Oh,  no!  These  are  matters  that  men  decide  for  them 
selves." 

"Possibly  the  fact  is  that  you  invite  without  desiring  to  do 
so." 

"Then  what,"  said  she,  suddenly  laughing  up  at  him,  "should 
I  have  to  think  of  your  rudeness  in  declining  my  invitation  all 
these  days?  " 

She  rose  on  that,  looking  about  for  coat  and  furs. 

"But  you  must  not  think  of  going,"  said  Canning,  instantly. 

The  thundering  of  his  feet  grew  very  audible  now. 

"The  instant  mamma  comes  back.  She  is  staying  a  long  time, 
is  n't  she?  Do  you  realize  that  we ' ve  been  here  hours  and  hours, 
and  that  it  looks  like  midnight  outdoors?  " 

"  Still,  it  would  be  a  satisfaction  to  finish  one  conversation  with 
you.  We  seem  to  remain  all  beginnings." 

"What  end  is  there  to  such  conversations  as  this,  Mr.  Can 
ning?" 

"  Conversations  end  in  many  ways,  Miss  Heth.  I  have  known 
them  to  end  like  journeys." 

The  man  left  the  fire,  advanced  to  her  side,  took  the  modish 
wrap  from  her  hands.  But  he  did  not  at  once  offer  to  hold  it 
for  her.  He  stood  two  feet  away  from  her,  and  a  gleam  came 
into  his  eyes,  faint  and  a  little  cold. 

84 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"But  I  wonder,"  said  he,  musingly,  "if  what  two  men  told 
you  in  a  summer-house  one  night  is  n't  quite  true,  after  all."  , 

"That  I  have  no  heart,  you  mean?" 

"  And  don't  know  the  meaning  of  being  kind.  Easter  lilies  are 
pretty  on  a  tomb,  but  they  were  never  my  favorite  flowers." 

"No,"  she  said,  "it  is  not  true.  My  heart  is  here"  —  she 
touched  the  place  —  "it  is  large  —  and  I  am,  oh,  very,  very 
kind." 

"You  are  rather  adorable,  you  know,"  said  his  abrupt  voice. 
"Here  is  your  coat." 

She  was  warm  to  the  eye,  animating,  of  an  exquisite  figure.  Her 
nearness  released  a  faint  fragrance.  She  slipped  her  left  arm  into 
the  sleeve  he  offered,  and  looking  up  at  him,  half  over  her 
shoulder,  said  with  a  mocking  little  laugh: 

"And  you  know  that  kind-hearted  girls  are  always  awfully 
credulous  ...  I  sweep  you  off  your  feet.  My  eyes  intoxicate 
you,  drive  you  mad!  Go  on.  I  've  told  you  that  I  like  your  pretty 
speeches." 

"I  do  not  always  stop  with  speeches  —  you  wild,  sweet 
thing  ..." 

So  Mr.  Canning;  and  with  that  speech  he  did  in  fact  stop  most 
abruptly,  and  at  once  turned  a  step  away.  In  the  sharp  brief 
silence,  Carlisle  put  on  her  other  sleeve  for  herself. 

From  the  hall,  almost  at  the  door,  it  seemed,  had  sounded  the 
brisk  approaching  voices  of  Mrs.  Heth  and  Kerr;  presumably  also 
of  Johnson.  Destiny,  having  had  its  way  with  their  absence,  was 
returning  them  upon  the  dot.  In  the  sitting-room,  talk  of  such 
matters  as  Miss  Heth's  wild  sweetness  necessarily  came  to  a 
sudden  conclusion. 

The  big  man  lounged  with  folded  arms.  His  look  was  slightly 
annoyed. 

"One  more  beginning,  and  you  have  your  way  again,  after  all! 
This  becomes  a  habit,"  said  he,  with  his  faint  ironic  note.  "  Miss 
Heth,  I  am  as  you  say  quite  dull  and  safe:  the  dullest  of  all  crea 
tures,  a  play  valetudinarian,  bored  to  ill-manners  at  times,  as  you 
have  observed,  by  large  overdoses  of  my  own  society.  Could  you 
take  pity  on  me?  Could  you  and  Mrs.  Heth  give  me  the  pleas- 

8s 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

ure  of  dining  with  me,  and  Kerr,  at  the  Arlington,  perhaps,  — 
or  wherever  else  you  may  prefer,  —  on  the  first  evening  you  can 
spare  for  deeds  of  mercy?" 

Carlisle  looked  at  him,  buttoning  her  glove.  Her  lips  smiled; 
but  in  truth  she  was  a  little  un  steadied  by  the  exciting  moment 
just  passed  through,  by  the  buoyant  sense  of  triumph  welling 
up  within  her.  Were  not  all  men,  however  exalted  or  difficult, 
alike  her  playthings  at  her  pleasure? 

"Of  course  I  shall  first  beg/'  added  Mr.  Canning,  "  to  be  per 
mitted  to  pay  my  respects  to  you  and  Mrs.  Heth  —  might  I 
say  to-morrow  afternoon  at  five?" 

"  We  shall  be  so  glad  to  see  you,  if  you  care  to  come,"  said  Car 
lisle,  looking  away  from  him.  "  As  to  dining,  that  would  be  very 
nice,  of  course,  —  but  are  you  sure  your  health  would  — " 

"Oh,  confound  my  health!"  cried  the  great  hermit.  "Pro 
mise  me  now  that  you  will  never  speak  the  word  in  my  presence 
again." 

"  I  promise  .  .  .  Only  really  —  if  my  invitation  to  gambol 
should  lead  you  to  — " 

"You  are  as  God  made  you,  Miss  Heth.  It's  not  your  fault 
that  you  invite." 

He  gave  her  a  look,  and,  turning,  swung  wide  the  door  for  the 
chaperon. 


VIII 

Supper  with  the  Cooneys:  Poor  Relations,  but  you  must  be  Nice 
to  them;  of  Hen  Cooney's  friend  V.  V.,  as  she  irritatingly  calls 
him;  also  relating  how  Catty  is  asked  for  her  Forgiveness,  and 
can't  seem  to  think  what  to  say. 

THE  Heths'  poor  relations,  the  Cooneys,  lived  in  a  two- 
story  frame  house  on  Centre  Street,  four  doors  from  a 
basement  dry-cleaning  establishment,  and  staring  full 
upon  the  show-window  of  an  artificial-limb  manufactory,  lately 
opened  for  the  grisly  trade. 

The  interval  between  the  families  of  Heth  and  Cooney  was 
as  these  facts  indicate.  If  Thornton  Heth  had  married  an  am 
bitious  woman,  and  he  had,  his  sister  Molly  had  displayed  less 
acumen.  The  Cooney  stock,  unlike  the  Thompson  as  it  was, 
deplorably  resembled  a  thousand  other  stocks  then  reproducing 
its  kind  in  this  particular  city.  The  War  had  flattened  it  out,  cut 
it  half  through  at  the  roots,  and  it  had  never  recovered,  as  econo 
mists  count  recovery,  and  would  n't,  for  a  generation  or  two  at 
the  least.  Accursed  contentment  flowed  in  the  young  Cooneys' 
blood.  They  had  abilities  enough,  but  the  sane  acquisitive  gift 
was  not  in  them.  They  were  poor,  but  unashamed.  They  were 
breezy,  keen,  adventurous,  without  fatigue.  They  claimed  the 
gasoline-cleaning  establishment  as  their  private  garage,  challeng 
ing  any  car  under  six  thousand  dollars  to  beat  the  expensive 
smell.  A  large  and  very  popular  group  of  family  jokes  centred 
about  the  plant  of  the  legman. 

Carlisle  Heth  "came  to  supper"  with  the  Cooneys,  as  agreed, 
on  the  Thursday  following  the  magic  afternoon  at  Willie's 
apartment.  The  week  intervening  had  been,  as  it  chanced,  one 
of  the  most  interesting  and  titillating  periods  of  her  life;  by  the 
same  token,  never  had  family  duty  seemed  more  drearily  super 
fluous.  However,  this  periodic,  say  quarterly,  mark  of  kins- 

87 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

man's  comity  w;t:,  required  of  her  by  her  father,  a  clannish  man 
by  inheritance,  and  one  who,  feeling  unable  to  "do"  anything 
i.i.l  for  lii,  ,i  ,fer'',  <  bildn  n,  yet,  shrank  from  th»-.  knocking 
suspicion  of  snobbery.  In  the  matter  of  interrnealing,  reciprocity 
wan  formally  observed  between  the  two  families.  Four  times 
per  annum  the  Cooneys  were  in  /.'•  i  body  to  dm«  .1  the 

ll'iu  .-    <>\   II-  ill,  Mr:;.  Heth  on  lh<  ,e  <,«  •  i.u  ,ti 

cally  of  her  concert's  relatives,  and  on  Christmas  wending  gifts 
of  an  almoat  offensively  utilitarian  nature. 

The  nofey  con  .in  filled  the  dingy  lili!<  parlor  to  overflow 
ing;  thi»,  though  Mrs.  Cooney  and  Hen,  having  nr.hed  out  for 
the  /,<  i-  •,;..'  ,  had  at  onee  »u  ,h-  -i  L;.-  i  !•-  I  h-  \,i<  |,;jr.il  i«>n  ,  foj 

»u[)f>er.  For  it  appeared  that  Hortenne  wa«  abnent  once  again, 
having  anked  to  ''git  tu  git"  a  night  off,  to  nee  her  Htep-daughter 
allianced  to  a  substitute  i'ullrnaji  porter.  The  two  laditi,  how 
ever,  were  only  gone  before,  not  lost,  and  through  the  portiere. 
joined  freely  in  the  conversation,  which  rattled  on  incessantly  in 
the  Cooney  style. 

Carlisle  sat  on  the  rusty  sofa,  listening  absently  to  the  chatter. 
HflT unaspiring  uncle-in-law,  the  Major,  who  was  vaguely  under 
stood  to  be  "in  insurance"  at  present,  parted  his  long  coat-tails 
before  the  Baltimore  heater, and  drifted  readily  to  remini  ren« 
I  ,'.ui  .e  and  'I  h<  odon  (n. .  the  family  liible  loo  '.tilfly  knew  Looloo 
and  'fee  Wee)  sat  together  on  a  divan,  indulging  in  banter,  with 
-.onie  giggling  from  Looloo  —  none  from  grave  Theodore.  Cha» 
informally  skimmed  an  evening pa[>er  in  a  corner,  with  comments: 
though  the  truth  was  that  precious  little  evi  ;  ;  •  '  )  "  / 
newipa[>er  which  was  new»  to  the  ke-  n  y.ung  Cooney*.  ,  ,  t 

"And  I  '.aid  to  lie,,/'  r,brrv/:r|  Major  T'oo/iey  to  hi-,  fashion 
able  niece,  having  now  got  his  sh' -it  hi  .lory  of  the  world  r|ov/n  .. 
far  as  the  '8os—  "now  stof>  your  whining  around  me,  Miss.   If 
you've  got  to  whine,  go  down   to   th<    <'ll.i/  :md    .i.md  in  the 
60fll«r<    Well—" 

"Why  could  she  whine  in  the  tellar,  father/   'I  hat  \><>\n\  r,  n't 
r,  sir,"  »aifl  Tee  Wee's  deep  voice. 

"  (iecause  it  was  a  whin<  •••  Jl  •>/  "'  cried  Hen,  through  the 
portieres. 


V     V.'s     Eyes 


rherewas  mild  laughter  at  this,  rather  derisive  on  the  part  of 
;ill  but  th.  N  but  when  Chas,  glancing  up  from  his  paper, 

remarked  crisply:   "Aw,  Miss  Mamie!    Like  to  speak  to  you  a 
minute,  please!"       the  merriment  seemed  mysteriously  ;. 
quire  a  more  genuine  ring.  Carlisle  ix>litely  inquired  who  Miss 
\         .   ,< 

Looloo,  who  alone  seemed  the  least  bit  awed  by  the  presence 
of  her  d&uling  cousin,  undertook  to  explain. 

"She's  Mamie  Willis,  Cally,  I  don't  believe  you  kjftOW  h«T» 
Well,  you  see  she  's  always  making  the  most  atrocious  puns,  and 
is  \ery  proud  of  them  -thinks  she  's  quite  a  wit,  SO|  you  $G% 
when  anybody  makes  an  awfully  bad  pun,  like  Hen's 

** Brightest  thing  1  've  heard  to-night/'  screamed  lien,  de 
fiantly,  through  the  curtains. 

"Aw,  Loo!"  came  her  mother's  soft  voice  from  the  unseen. 
"  Run  upstairs  and  get  half  a  doficn  napkins,  my  child.  The  \\  a>h 
is  in  the  basket  on  my  bed," 

"We  always  pretend  like  we're  repeating  it  to  Miss  Mamie, 
just  for  fun/'  concluded  Looloo.  "Yes  'mt  mother!" 

" Oh!  I  see,"  said  Carlisle. 

She  had  donned  for  the  coming  to  supper  a  plain  housfc-dmi 
of  soft  dark-green  silk,  two  summers  old  and  practically  discarded. 
("  This  old  thing,  my  dearl  Why,  it  positively  belongs  in  the  ru^ 
ftax</")  She  never  dressed  much  for  the  Cooneys,  Also,  by 
wholly  mechanical  processes  of  adjustment  to  environment,  her 
manner  and  air  became  simpler,  somewhat  unkeyed :  she  uncon- 
sciously'folded  away  her  more  shining  wings.  Nevertheless,  then" 
was  about  her  to-night  a  tlccting  kind  ot  r.uliamv  which  had 
caught  the  notice  of  more  than  one  of  her  cavalier  cousins,  nota 
bly  of  pretty  little  Looloo,  who  had  kissed  the  visit  or  shyly  ^for  a 
Cooiv •  N  . ~ct  ing,  anil  said, "  O\\,  Cally !  You  do  Ux^k  ,\\>  lovely !  ** 

C^ally  herself  was  awaiv  v>t  an  inner  buoyanvY  ixKlly  at  variance 
with  the  drab  Cvnwey  militH*  Recent  prioress  in  the  great  game 
h.ul  n\ort*  than  blotted  out  all  memory  of  little  mishaps  at  the 
Beach  ,  .  . 

Starting  aloft  for  the  napkins,  Looloo  was  adroitly  tripped  by 
\\  ec,  and  fell  back  upon  him  with  a  little  shriek.    Instead 

So 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


of  checking  the  tumult  that  followed,  Major  Cooney,  including 
Carlisle  in  the  proceedings  with  a  mischievous  wink,  called 
out :  "  Give  it  to  him,  Loo !  Give  it  to  him ! "  Loo,  having  got  her 
small  hand  in  his  hair,  gave  it  to  him,  good-fashion.  Tee  Wee 
moaned,  and  Chas  made  a  fairly  successful  effort  to  gag  him 
with  the  newspaper.  In  the  midst  of  the  uproar,  Mrs.  Cooney's 
gentle  voice  could  be  heard  calling,  "  Supper,  supper,"  and  Hen, 
entering  with  a  large  dinner-bell,  conceived  the  whimsey  of  ring 
ing  it  loudly  in  everybody's  ear. 

Presently,  after  much  noise  and  confusion,  they  were  seated  at 
the  antique  mahogany,  with  the  dent  near  one  edge  where  a 
Yankee  cavalryman  had  rested  his  spurred  foot  too  carelessly 
once  upon  a  time.  It  was  then  observed  that  Hen,  having  silenced 
her  great  clapper,  was  unobtrusively  gone  from  the  midst.  The 
circumstance  proved  of  interest  to  the  younger  Cooney s. 

"  She  's  nursing  a  little  bunch  of  violets  she  got  three  days  ago," 
Tee  Wee  explained  to  Carlisle.  "Says  she's  going  to  wear  'em 
to  the  Masons'  to-morrow,  though  anybody  can  see  they  can't 
possibly  live  through  the  night." 

"I  thought  I  saw  a  purple  box  in  the  front  window  as  I  drove 
up,"  said  Carlisle.  "  Is  it  a  secret  who  sent  them?  " 

"  'Bout  forty,"  said  Chas,  making  a  fine  one-hand  catch  of  a 
napkin.  "You'd  hardly  call  'em  a  bunch,  Tee  Wee  —  more  like 
a  nosegay." 

"Pass  this  coffee  to  Cally,  son." 

"Bob  Dunn  sent  'em,  Cally,  down  at  the  bookstore,"  said 
Looloo,  sweetly.  "And  he  wrote  Hen  a  love-letter  Thanksgiving 
beginning,  'Darling  Miss  Cooney.'  " 

"That  so?"  said  Tee  Wee,  who  was  just  home  from  the  Uni 
versity  for  Christmas  and  not  up  on  all  the  news  yet.  "How  'd 
he  sign  it  —  'Your  loving  Mr.  Dunn'  ?" 

"'Aye  some  werry  nice  'am,  Cally?" 

"Yes  —  thank  you.  But  do  go  on  and  tell  me  about  Mr. 
Dunn.  Does  Hen  like  him?  " 

"No,  but  she  loves  violets,"  said  Tee  Wee.  "Made  me  sit  up 
half  of  last  night,  fanning  'em  for  her." 

"Loo,  pass  Charles's  plate,  daughter." 

90 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Carlisle  surveyed  the  noisy  table  as  from  some  lofty  peak.  She 
knew  that  the  Cooney  habit  of  monopolizing  all  conversation, 
and  dashing  straight  through  every  topic,  was  only  their  poor- 
but-proud  way  of  showing  off:  sometimes  it  was  a  little  irritat 
ing,  but  to-night  only  rather  fatiguing  to  the  ear-drums.  The 
children  came  two  years  apart,  as  regular  as  some  kind  of  bi 
annual  publication;  Looloo,  seventeen,  being  the  youngest,  and 
also  the  best-looking  and  the  most  popular  in  the  family.  But 
then  all  the  Cooneys  were  good-looking,  including  the  Major, 
and  all  were  popular  in  the  family.  In  fact,  they  were  more  like 
a  house-party  than  a  family  at  all :  and  in  some  ways  they  rather 
resembled  a  queer  little  secret  fraternity,  enjoying  strange  de 
lights  and  responding  with  shrieks  to  unintelligible  catchwords. 

To-night  the  talk  was  more  than  usually  disjointed,  owing  to  the 
regrettable  absence  of  Hortense.  There  was  constant  jumping 
up,  infinite  "passing."  Mr.  Tee  Wee,  manipulating  the  water- 
pitcher  from  the  side-table,  complained  aside  to  his  mother  at 
the  universal  thirst.  Chas,  it  seemed,  had  charge  of  the  heating- 
up  of  the  later  crops  of  biscuits:  he  kept  springing  off  to  the 
kitchen,  now  and  then  returning  with  a  neaping  platter  of  what 
he  called  his  little  brown  beauties. 

In  the  midst  of  the  confusion,  Hen  strode  in,  looking  some 
what  defiant,  and  instantly  drew  the  fires  of  all. 

"How  're  the  little  patients,  Hen?  Number  9  looked  pretty 
sick  to  me  this — " 

"Best  thing  I  know  is  running  'em  up  and  down  the  hall,  and 
then  brisk  massage  — " 

"Gargled  'em  yet,  Hen?" 

Hen,  laughing  wildly,  stood  her  ground. 

"That's  all  right!"  she  retorted  to  the  last  sally,  which  hap 
pened  to  be  Chas's.  "There  are  swains  in  this  town  who  might 
boost  their  standing  a  little  if  only  they  'd  patronize  the  florist 
once  in  a  while!" 

This  drew  loud  approbation,  and  Chas  (who  was  understood 
to  be  very  attentive  to  a  Miss  Leither  —  Leither!  —  of  the  Wo 
man's  Exchange),  laughing  with  the  majority,  threw  up  his 
hands,  saying,  "Hellup!  Hellup!" 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

He  fled  to  the  kitchen  to  look  after  his  little  brown  beauties. 
The  noisy  supper  proceeded.  Presently  Major  Cooney,  the  easy 
going  and  reminiscent,  gave  the  conversation  a  new  tack. 

"And  where  are  your  violets,  Cally,  my  dear?"  he  asked,  di 
recting  one  of  his  mischievous  winks  at  Looloo.  "You  must 
have  a  flower-shop  full  at  home,  if  what  we  hear  is  true." 

Carlisle,  on  the  point  of  saying  something  slightly  caustic 
about  Chas  as  a  swain,  found  the  tables  abruptly  turned.  All 
the  Cooneys  were  looking  at  her.  She  said  with  equanimity  that, 
on  the  contrary,  she  got  so  few  flowers  that  when  she  did  have 
any,  she  sat  up  at  night  with  them  just  like  Hen. 

"And  I  '11  wear  'em  to  the  Masons'  to-morrow  night,  too!" 
said  Hen,  throwing  round  a  look  which  challenged  contradic 
tion. 

"Now,  cousin,  what's  the  use?"  said  Chas,  reentering  with 
his  platter.  "The  Visitor  is  giving  you  the  rush  of  your  young 
life,  and  we  're  all  on.  Take  a  handful  of  my  beauties." 

"  You  mean  Mr.  Canning?  My  dear  Chas,  if  he  only  were ! " 

There  was  no  rebuffing  the  Cooneys.  They  began  their  little 
third-degree  system. 

"He  called  on  you  last  Thursday  afternoon,  did  n't  he,  Cally?  " 
said  Looloo,  laughing,  with  a  little  face  for  her  daring. 

"One  call,  my  dear  child!" 

"You  went  motoring  with  him  on  Friday,"  said  Theodore, 
gravely,  "and  stopped  for  tea  at  the  Country  Club  at  6.20,  you 
taking  chocolate  — 

"One  motor-ride!" 

"You  dined  with  him  at  the  Arlington  on  Monday  night, 
table  decorations  being  small  diamond  necklaces  — " 

"Good  heavens!"  laughed  Carlisle,  coloring  a  little.  "All 
this  is  terribly  circumstantial!  I  had  no  idea  my  movements 
were  — " 

"Movement  is  useless  —  don't  move,  lady!  We  have  you 
covered — ' 

"There,  there,  children!  —  stop  showing  your  jealousy," 
laughed  Mrs.  Cooney;  and  her  eyes  rested  with  a  brief  wistful- 
ness  on  the  shining  niece  who  plumed  eagle's  feathers  for  flights 

92 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


where  her  daughters  would  never  follow.   "You'd  all  give  your 
eye-teeth  to  be  half  as  pretty  and  attractive  as  Cally  ..." 

" Yes'm,"  said  Chas.  "Well,  then,  Cally,  have  one  more  sar 
dine,  please.  Nothing  on  earth  for  the  complexion  like  these  fat 
saline  fellows  that  mother  catches  fresh  every  morning  with  her 
little  hook  and  line.  —  Mind,  Loo!  You're  joggling  The  Bowl." 

Carlisle  was  hardly  to  be  overwhelmed  by  the  Cooneys'  teas 
ing,  nor  perhaps  was  she  seriously  displeased  by  it.  Even  less 
did  the  detail  of  her  eccentric  cousins'  knowledge  surprise  her. 
If  there  was  a  fight  or  a  fire,  a  bon  mot  launched  or  a  heart 
broken,  money  made  or  a  death  died,  it  invariably  happened 
that  one  of  the  Cooneys  was  "just  passing."  .  .  . 

In  the  middle  of  the  table  stood  an  object  of  shiny  green 
crockery,  which  seemed  to  be  a  cross  between  a  fruit-dish  and  a 
vase.  Most  of  the  table  service  was  quite  familiar  to  Carlisle, 
not  a  little  of  it  having  started  life  as  Christmas  presents  from 
the  Heths.  But  this  crockery  piece  was  new,  and,  upon  Chas's 
admonition,  its  shiny  hideousness  caught  and  riveted  her  atten 
tion. 

"Aunt  Rose  Hopwood's  parting  gift,"  said  Tee  Wee,  softly, 
following  her  fascinated  gaze.  "Oh,  Cally,  ain't  it  boo'ful!" 

"Theodore,"  said  his  mother,  quite  sharply,  "I  don't  think 
your  stay  at  the  University  has  improved  your  manners." 

Theodore  colored  abruptly  and  deeply.  "Why,  I  —  I  was 
only  funning,  mother." 

"I  think  that's  a  very  poor  sort  of  funning.  And  this  applies 
to  you,  too,  Charles." 

"Yes'm,"  said  Charles,  starting. 

The  eldest-born  made  no  other  reply  to  his  mother,  nor  did 
Theodore :  meekness  under  parental  reproof  being  another  of  the 
odd  Cooney  characteristics.  Conversation  seemed  about  to  lan 
guish  ;  but  Mrs.  Cooney,  as  if  to  show  that  the  episode  was  closed, 
said  equably: 

"By  the  way,  Cally,  Cousin  Martha  Heth  is  coming  next  week 
to  make  us  quite  a  visit.  If  you  are  not  too  busy,  do  try  to  come 
in  some  time,  and  cheer  her  up.  She  is  going  to  take  treatment 
for  her  nose  and  also  for  flatfoot,  and  I  fear  is  very  miserable." 

93 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

After  supper  Carlisle  sat  on  the  sofa,  feeling  rather  sardiney, 
and  had  an  irritating  talk  with  Aunt  Molly,  the  subject  being 
Chas's  affair  with  his  Leither,  for  the  furtherance  of  which  he 
was  reported  to  be  even  now  arraying  himself  upstairs.  The 
complacence  with  which  Aunt  Molly  regarded  the  threatened  alli 
ance  —  all  possible  objections  being  answered  in  her  mind  by  a 
helpless,  "If  she  is  the  girl  he  loves?"  —  was  most  provokingly 
characteristic  of  the  Cooneys'  fatal  shiftlessness.  And  they  were 
popular,  too,  in  their  way,  and  Chas  might  easily  have  married 
some  socially  prominent  girl  with  money,  instead  of  bringing  a 
nameless  saleslady  into  the  family.  It  was  impossible  for  Car 
lisle  not  to  contrast  her  aunt's  flabby  sentimentalism  with  her 
own  and  her  mother's  sane,  brilliant  ambitiousness.  If  nothing 
succeeds  like  success,  how  doubly  true  it  was  that  nothing  fails 
like  failure. 

Carlisle  had  reached  a  point  where  she  longed  to  shake  her 
aunt,  when  Hen,  who  had  been  "scrapping  up"  with  Looloo, 
came  in,  putting  an  end  to  the  futile  talk. 

To  her  mother's  demand  if  they  had  stayed  to  wash  the  dishes, 
Hen  replied  that  they  thought  they  might  just  as  well:  there 
were  n't  many,  and  the  water  was  nice  and  hot.  And  Chas,  hear 
ing  the  clatter  from  aloft,  had  slipped  down  the  backstairs  in 
his  suspenders,  and  lent  a  hand  with  the  wiping.  Mrs.  Cooney 
chided,  saying  the  dishes  should  have  been  left  for  Hortense, 
to-morrow  morning  before  breakfast.  She  asked  Hen  whether 
Chas  knew  that  his  white  vest  had  come  in  with  the  wash,  and 
though  Hen  was  pretty  sure  he  did,  Aunt  Molly  presently  made 
an  excuse  and  slipped  away  upstairs.  She  was  a  great  hand  for 
being  by  when  the  children  were  dressing  to  go  out,  and  no  one 
in  the  family,  not  even  Chas,  could  tie  a  white  lawn  bow  half  so 
well  as  mother.  .  .  . 

Looloo  lingered  in  the  dining-room,  the  family  sitting-room  of 
evenings,  where  Theodore  had  engaged  his  father  at  checkers. 
Hen,  dropping  into  a  chair  by  the  sofa  as  if  she  were  rather  tired, 
asked  Cally  for  gossip  of  the  gay  world,  but  Cally  answered 
briefly  out  of  regard  for  the  chasm  between:  how  contract  the 
name  and  fame  of  Mr.  Canning  to  fit  this  shabby  little  "parlor"? 

94 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Hen  was  thin,  colorless,  and  sweet-faced,  and  was  known  in  the 
family  (for  the  Cooneys,  strange  to  say,  knew  of  enormous  indi 
vidual  differences  among  themselves)  as  the  most  thoughtful  and 
considerate  of  the  children,  and  as  alone  possessing  the  real  Am 
bler  nose.  She  rather  suggested  some  slender  pale  flower,  made 
to  look  at  its  slenderest  and  palest  beside  her  cousin's  rich  blos 
som.  Still,  Hen  was  accounted  a  fine  stenographer:  they  paid 
her  sixty  dollars  a  month  at  the  bookstore,  where  she  earned  double 
at  least. 

For  five  minutes  the  talk  between  these  two  girls,  of  about  the 
same  age  and  blood  but,  it  seemed,  almost  without  a  point  of 
contact,  was  considerably  perfunctory.  Then,  by  an  odd  chance 
and  in  the  wink  of  an  eye,  it  took  on  a  very  distinct  interest. 
Carlisle  inquired  if  Hen  had  ever  heard  of  a  man  named  V.  Vivian, 
said  to^'a  nephew  of  Mr.  Beirne;  and  Hen,  with  a  little  ex 
clamation,  and  a  certain  quickening  of  countenance,  replied  that 
she  had  been  raised  with  him.  Moreover,  she  referred  to  him  as 
V.  V 

Though  the  Cooneys  knew  everybody,  as  well  as  everything, 
and  though  Carlisle  had  thought  before  now  of  putting  an  in 
quiry  to  Hen  or  Chas  in  this  particular  direction,  the  manner  of 
her  cousin's  reply  was  a  decided  surprise  to  her,  and  somehow 
a  disagreeable  surprise. 

"Oh!  Really?"  said  she,  rather  coldly.  "I  understood  — 
some  one  told  me  —  that  the  man  had  just  come  here  to  live." 

"He's  just  come  back,"  explained  Hen,  with  interest.  "Why, 
he  was  born  here,  Cally,  three  doors  from  where  we  used  to 
live  down  on  Third  Street  —  remember?  Well,  Dr.  Vivian  lived 
right  there  till  he  was  sixteen  or  seventeen  — " 

"Why  do  you  call  him  Dr.  Vivian?" 

"Well,  that's  what  he  is,  you  see.  He's  a  doctor  —  medical 
man." 

"He  does  n't  look  in  the  least  like  a  medical  man  to  me,"  said 
Carlisle,  as  if  that  ought  to  settle  something. 

"Oh!  You  know  him,  then?" 

"I  have  spoken  to  him,"  replied  Carlisle,  her  gaze  full  on 
Hen's  face.  "You  see  a  great  deal  of  him,  I  suppose?" 

95 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"No,  we  don't,"  said  Hen,  with  an  odd  air,  suggestive  of  re 
gret.  "  He  keeps  so  terribly  busy.  Besides  being  sort  of  a  mis 
sionary  doctor,  he 's  always  working  on  dozens  of  grand  schemes 
of  one  sort  or  another.  His  latest  is  to  raise  about  a  million 
dollars  and  buy  the  Dabney  House  for  a  Settlement!  How  's 
that  for  a  tall  one?  He  just  mentioned  it  to  me  this  morning,  en 
passant,  and  says  I  must  help  him  raise  the  million  — " 

"I  suppose  you  did  n't  know  that  one  of  his  grand  schemes  was 
to  write  a  terrible  article  in  the  paper  attacking  papa  and  the 
Works?" 

"Oh!"  said  Hen,  plucking  a  thread  from  her  old  black  skirt. 
"Oh,  that  letter  in  the  'Post,'  long  ago,  you  mean?  Yes,  I  — 
knew  about  that;  I  wanted  to  speak  to  you  about  it  at  the  time. 
Did  you  read  it,  Cally?" 

"I  glanced  at  it,"  said  Cally,  shortly. 

Full  of  the  interest  of  thundering  feet  as  the  week  had  been  since 
Willie  and  mamma  had  given  her  the  connecting  link,  Carlisle 
had  in  fact  made  a  point  of  getting  hold  of  a  copy  of  the  old  paper 
containing  that  particular  piece.  Not  being  at  all  familiar  with 
Works  and  newspapers,  she  had  found  the  process  involved  with 
considerable  perplexity  and  trouble,  but  she  had  felt  amply  re 
warded  in  the  end.  The  piece  came  to  her  hand  like  a  weapon, 
against  any  possible  remeeting  with  its  remembered  author. 

Now  she  regarded  Hen  with  steadily  rising  annoyance. 

"  What  was  your  friend's  idea  in  writing  such  outrageous  stuff, 
do  you  know?  Is  he  really  crazy,  as  they  say,  or  is  he  just  an 
ordinary  notoriety  seeker?" 

Colorless  Hen  looked  rather  hard  at  her  pretty  cousin.  She 
allowed  a  perceptible  pause  to  fall  before  she  said: 

"I  thought  you  said  you  knew  him." 

"No;  I  said  that  I  barely  spoke  to  him  once." 

"If  you  only  said  good-morning  to  him  —  if  you  only  looked 
at  him  once,  on  the  street  —  I  don't  see  how  you  could  possibly 
imagine  .  .  .  Why,  Cally,  he's  about  the  least  self-seeking  hu 
man  being  that  ever  lived.  He's  so  absolutely  un-self-seeking 
that  he  gives  away  every  single  thing  he 's  got,  to  anybody  that 
comes  along  and  wants  it.  In  the  first  place,  he 's  giving  away 

96 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

his  life  .  .  .  Some  of  his  ideas  may  be  visionary  or  mistaken, 
but—" 

"I  should  think  so,  after  glancing  at  his  article.  What  was  his 
object,  then,  my  dear?" 

"Well,  that's  simple,  I  should  think.  He  went  to  the  Works, 
and  thought  that  conditions  there  were  bad,  and  being  what 
would  be  called  the  reformer  type,  I  suppose  he  thought  it  his 
duty  to  tell  people  so,  so  that  the  conditions  would  be  cor 
rected —  " 

"Well,  really,  Hen!  Don't  you  know,  if  conditions  were  bad 
at  the  Works,  —  whatever  that  may  mean,  and  I  for  one  have 
never  felt  that  working-girls  were  entitled  to  Turkish  baths  and 
manicures,  —  don't  you  know  papa  would  correct  what  was  wrong 
without  being  called  a  homicide  by  —  by  eccentric  medical 
men?" 

Hen  hesitated,  and  then  began:  "Well,  business  is  hard,  Cally, 
and  men  in  business  — " 

"Why  does  n't  your  friend  try  attending  to  his  own,  then,  the 
medical  business,  instead  of  interfering  all  the  time  with  other 
people's?" 

The  Cooney  answered  quite  easily:  "  You  see,  he  'd  say  this  was 
his  business."  Then  she  smiled  a  little,  thoughtfully,  and  said: 
"He'd  say,  Cally,  that  the  world's  all  one  family,  and  every 
body's  responsible  for  everybody  else.  The  cute  part  about  it 
is  that  he  absolutely  believes  it.  ...  And  it  worries  him  that 
people  are  n't  as  happy  as  they  ought  to  be,  the  poor  because 
they  have  n't  anything  to  be  happy  with,  the  rich  because  they 
have  too  much.  He  and  Mr.  Beirne  argue  about  that  for  hours. 
He 's  absolutely  the  only  person  I  ever  saw  who  really  does  n't 
care  for  —  " 

"Why,  my  dear!"  interrupted  Carlisle,  smiling  rather  dan 
gerously.  "  You  '11  make  me  believe  that  you  admire  the  man 
immensely." 

Hen  laughed,  and  replied  enigmatically:  "Well,  it's  nice  to  feel 
free  to  admire  what  's  admirable,  don't  you  think  so?" 

"  You  do  admire  him  very  much?  " 

"I  think  he's  perfectly  precious,"  said  Henrietta  Cooney. 

97 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

A  peal  of  triumph  from  the  rear  room  indicated  that  Major 
Cooney  had  reached  the  king-row  in  the  teeth  of  bitter  opposition. 
The  peal  came  from  Looloo,  who  should  have  been  reading  "Le 
Bourgeois  Gentilhomme"  with  a  big  dictionary  instead  of  hang 
ing  over  her  father's  shoulder.  Footsteps  above  suggested  that 
Chas  and  Aunt  Molly  were  making  a  careful  toilet  indeed  for 
his  call  upon  the  obscure  inamorata. 

In  the  Cooney  parlor,  the  two  girls  looked  at  each  other.  Car 
lisle  tried  hard  to  stare  Hen  down,  and  failed.  In  this  moment 
she  felt  that  she  positively  disliked  her  commonly  negligible 
cousin.  She  had  proved  and  re-proved  to  her  own  almost  com 
plete  satisfaction  that  the  man  who  had  spoken  the  affronting 
words  to  her  in  the  summer-house  was  a  virulent  religious  fanatic, 
or  (since  she  had  read  the  piece)  a  crazy  Socialist,  like  the  man 
who  had  thrown  the  brick  at  papa,  or  both;  almost  certainly  both. 
She  was,  it  might  be  said,  deeply  and  irrevocably  committed  to 
these  beliefs:  they  settled  and  explained  everything,  and  no 
more  need  to  think  or  worry.  It  was  simply  not  to  be  endured 
that  Henrietta  Cooney  should  cheekily  sit  there  and  try  to  un 
settle  everything,  pretending.  .  .  . 

"But  understand  me,  Cally,"  Henrietta  was  saying,  with  pro 
voking  calm.  "Of  course  I  didn't  like  that  letter  a  bit.  You 
see  — Heth  was  n't  any  more  than  a  name  to  V.  V.,  a  sort  of 
symbol,  when  he  wrote  it.  But  I  think  it  was  a  mistake  all 
through,  and  I  scolded  him  well  at  the  time — " 

"Oh,  did  you?"  said  Cally,  her  cheeks  very  pink.  "I  im 
agined  you  thought  it  perfectly  precious  of  him  to  call  papa  a 
shameless  homicide." 

"Why,  you  know  I  never  thought  anything  of  the  sort,  Cally 
dear,"  answered  Hen.  .  .  . 

She  seemed  surprised  by  the  signs  of  her  cousin's  displeasure 
(which  really  did  seem  excessive  for  a  business  controversy 
nearly  two  months  old)  and  went  on  in  what  was  evidently  in 
tended  to  be  quite  a  soothing  manner: 

"You  know,  men  are  always  hammering  each  other  over  things 
like  this  —  it 's  really  not  nearly  so  awful  as  it  sounds!  .  .  .  And 
honestly,  Cally,  that  letter  was  n't  at  all  representative  of  V.  V.  — 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


even  though  he  probably  thought  it  was!  I  mean  ...  he  may 
talk  in  that  fierce  way  about  whole  classes,  but  when  it  comes 
down  to  people  —  individuals  —  he 's  about  the  kindest  person. 
What  he  really  thinks  is  —  well,  that  everybody's  good.  .  .  . 
Here's  what  I  mean,  Cally,'"  said  Hen,  laughing  a  little,  but  with 
a  certain  eagerness  too,  as  if  it  were  of  some  importance  for  Cally 
to  see  what  she  meant.  .  .  .  "  You  know  him,  you  say  —  slightly, 
of  course.  Well,  instead  of  writing  any  more  letters  about  the 
Works,  do  you  know  what  it  would  be  exactly  like  him  to  do 
now?" 

"Throw  a  bomb  in  at  papa's  office- window ?" 

"No,  speak  to  you  about  it ! "  laughed  Henrietta,  unabashed  — 
"  some  time  when  he  sees  you  at  Mr.  Beirne's  or  somewhere  — 
ask  you  in  the  nicest,  most  natural  way  to  ask  Uncle  Thornton 
if  he  won't  build  a  new  Works!  And  you'd  see  from  the  way  he 
looked  at  you  that  he  was  perfectly  sure  you  were  going  to  do  it, 
too!" 

Cally  gazed  at  Hen  silently  for  at  least  ten  seconds. 

"I  'd  enjoy  immensely  having  him  try  it,"  said  she  slowly. 
"  Immensely  I  I  —  I  Ve  wanted  for  some  time  to  say  a  few  words 
to  him.  .  .  ." 

At  that  moment  the  broken  Cooney  doorbell  rang  feebly, 
and  within  one  minute  V.  Vivian  came  walking  into  the  little 
parlor. 

Supping  at  the  Cooneys  was  not  usually  so  interesting  as  this. 

When  the  bell  rang,  Looloo,  springing  up  from  the  Major's 
side  in  the  dining-room,  hurriedly  pulled  shut  the  folding-doors 
between.  She  apologized  to  her  cousin  through  the  diminish 
ing  crack,  saying  that  it  was  probably  awful  Bob  Dunn,  and 
Cally  could  come  hide  in  there  with  them  if  she  'd  rather.  But 
Cally  said  briefly  that  she  was  not  afraid,  and  had  to  go  home  in 
a  little  while  anyway. 

In  the  same  moment  Carlisle  heard  the  voice  of  the  caller  in 
the  hall,  for  whom  Hen  had  just  opened  the  door.  She  recognized 
this  voice  at  the  first  word.  And  she  involuntarily  rose  in  the 
Cooney  parlor,  feeling  the  oddest,  suddenest,  most  unreasoning 

99 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


impulse  to  go  at  once  into  the  dining-room,  after  all,  and  be  with 
Looloo,  and  watch  them  play  checkers  for  a  little  while.  .  .  . 

It  was  the  surprise  of  it;  nothing  more.  And  Carlisle  overcame 
that  impulse.  She  remained  standing  motionless,  reconsidering 
as  by  lightning  flashes  the  quite  complicated  point  of  etiquette 
that  so  suddenly  confronted  her.  What  was  a  lady's  proper 
attitude  toward  a  nobody  who  has  called  her  father  a  shame 
less  homicide  and  herself  a  God-pitiful  poor  little  thing?  There 
was  no  experience  to  guide  here.  But  clearer  and  clearer  it 
seemed  to  become  to  Cally  that  to  hold  any  converse  with  such 
an  one  could  only  be,  after  all,  essentially  debasing.  Icy  indif 
ference  was  the  stingingest  rebuke.  .  .  . 

Henrietta  came  through  the  door,  with  the  lame  medical  man 
behind  her.  Without  looking  at  him,  Cally  gathered  that  the 
man  found  the  sight  of  her  properly  disquieting. 

"  You  know  my  cousin,  Miss  Heth,  I  believe  —  Doctor  Vivian, 
Cally." 

"Oh!  .  .  .  How  do  you  do!"  said  the  doctor. 

Carlisle,  not  advancing  from  the  sofa-side,  said: 

"I  remember  Dr.  Vivian." 

"Well,  sit  down,  both  of  you,"  said  Hen. 

And  then  Henrietta,  with  that  audacious  forwardness  which 
the  Cooneys  mistook  for  humor,  smiled  treacherously  at  her 
cousin  over  the  caller's  shoulder,  and  said: 

"And  entertain  each  other  a  moment,  won't  you?  I  have 
got  to  speak  to  mother.  ..." 

On  that  Hen  left  them.  Through  some  bias  in  its  ancient 
hinges,  the  parlor  door  swung  to  behind  her.  It  shut  with  a 
loud  click.  From  behind  the  other  closed  doors,  the  merry 
voices  of  the  checker-players  and  rooter  grew  very  audible. 

Despite  the  hostess's  cordial  injunction,  the  two  young  people 
in  the  shut  Cooney  parlor  did  not  immediately  sit  down  and 
begin  to  entertain  each  other.  Both  remained  standing  exactly 
where  Hen  had  left  them,  and  there  ensued  a  hiatus  of  entertain 
ment  just  long  enough  to  be  quite  distinctly  appreciable. 

Then  the  absurdity  of  her  —  Miss  Heth's  —  feeling  constraint 
before  this  Mr.  —  no,  Dr.  —  Vivian,  this  friend  of  the  Cooneys 

100 


V.    V.'s     Eyes   . 

and  malicious  attacker  of  the  Cooneys'  relatives'  characters, 
rushed  over  the  girl  inspiritingly.  Then  it  occurred  to  her  simply 
to  incline  her  head  coldly,  and  leave  the  man  without  a  word: 
dignified  that,  yet  possibly  open  to  misconstruction.  So,  taking 
one  graceful  step  toward  the  door,  Carlisle  said,  with  a  suffi 
ciency  of  distant  hauteur: 

"You  can  entertain  yourself,  I  hope?    I  am  going." 

The  tall  young  man  removed  his  gaze  from  the  blank  space 
left  by  Hen's  exit,  with  a  kind  of  start,  and  said  hurriedly: 

"  I  hope  you  are  n't  letting  me  drive  you  away?  I  — I  merely 
stopped  a  moment  in  passing,  on  a  —  a  prof essional  matter.  .  .  ." 

"  Why  should  you  imagine  that  I  am  anxious  to  avoid  you  ?  " 

He  said,  with  gratifying  embarrassment:  "I  naturally  could 
n't  hope  that  —  you  would  wish  to  see  me  — " 

And  then  suddenly  all  her  just  and  fortifying  resentment 
seemed  to  return  to  her,  and  she  said  with  frosty  calm: 

"  Yes,  I  Ve  rather  wanted  to  see  you  again.  I  did  n't  quite 
place  you  when  —  I  had  this  opportunity  before  .  .  .  " 

The  man  regarded  the  floor.  He  looked  as  if  he  knew  what 
was  coming. 

"  I  Ve  recently  read  your  letter  in  the  '  Post '  about  my  father. 
Tell  me,  what  pleasure  do  you  find  in  writing  such  wicked  un 
truths  about  people  who  Ve  never  harmed  you?" 

In  her  mind  it  had  seemed  exactly  the  thing  to  say,  the  rebuke 
which  would  put  him  finally  in  his  place  on  all  scores,  show  him 
up  completely  to  himself.  But  the  moment  it  was  out,  it  ac 
quired  somehow  the  wrong  sound,  jangling  and  a  little  shrewish 
and  somewhat  common,  and  she  rather  wished  she  had  n't  said 
it.  She  had  never  seen  anybody  turn  pale  so  suddenly.  .  .  . 

The  man  wore  the  same  clothes  he  had  worn  in  the  summer- 
house,  she  thought;  indubitably  the  same  large  four-in-hand, 
floating  the  fat  white  painted  shad,  or  perch.  He  was  rather 
better-looking  in  the  face  than  she  had  supposed;  and  in  this 
light  she  observed  more  clearly  the  rather  odd  expression  he 
wore  about  the  eyes,  a  quality  of  youthful  hopefulness,  a  sort  of 
confidingness:  not  the  look  of  a  brick-thrower,  unless  you  hap 
pened  to  know  the  facts  in  the  case.  All  this,  of  course,  was 

101 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


his  own  lookout.  If  he  wanted  to  say  and  do  outrageous  things, 
he  had  no  right  to  appear  so  pained  when  he  got  his  merited 
punishment.  He  had  no  right  to  put  on  that  appealing  look.  He 
had  no  right  to  be  lame  .  .  . 

"It  is  perfectly  natural  for  you  to  say  and  think  that,"  he 
was  saying  with  an  odd  air  of  introspection,  quite  as  if  he  were 
reassuring  somebody  inside  of  him.  "I  don't  think  there  was 
anything  untrue  in  that  letter,  but  —  no  doubt  it  must  have 
seemed  so.  And  of  course  ...  I  don't  suppose  you  can  go  to  the 
Heth  Works  much,  or  be  very  familiar  — 

"It  is  n't  necessary  for  me  to  go  to  the  Works  to  learn  that  my 
father  is  not  a  homicide." 

Her  voice  had  lost  something  of  its  first  ringing  assurance.  It 
seemed  to  shake  a  little,  like  an  indignant  child's. 

The  young  man  said  hurriedly: 

"No,  no!  Of  course  not!  I  —  indeed,  I  think  you  misunder 
stood  what  I  meant  to  say  in  —  in  that  letter.  I  must  have  ex 
pressed  myself  badly.  I  did  not  intend  so  much  a  —  a  criticism 
of  individuals,  as  of  society,  for  — 

"Oh,  please  don't  apologize.  That's  always  rather  silly,  I 
think.  I  like  to  see  people  with  the  courage  of  their  convictions, 
no  matter  how  wrong  they  are.  Good-evening." 

"Don't  go,"  said  the  slum  physician,  instantly,  much  as  Mr. 
Canning  had  said  at  a  similar  yet  totally  different  moment  — 
"  that  is  —  must  you  —  go  at  once?  I  —  there  is  something  I  've 
wanted  very  much  to  tell  you." 

She  stopped  still;  stood  in  silence  gazing  at  Dalhousie's  friend, 
the  shabby  author  of  the  two  Severe  Arraignments.  Undoubt 
edly  there  was  a  sinking  feeling  within  her,  unsteadying  in  its 
way.  But  she  was  spirited,  and  into  her  eyes  had  come  a  hostile 
challenge.  Passionately  she  dared  this  man  to  ask  God  to  pity 
her  again.  .  .  . 

Her  eyes  were  oval  and  lifted  the  least  bit  at  the  outer  corners. 
The  bow  of  her  upper  lip  drew  up  a  little  most  engagingly  at  the 
middle  (like  Teresa  Durbeyfield's),  an  irregularity  more  endear 
ing  to  the  eye  than  any  {lawlessness.  There  was  the  possibility  ot 
tenderness  in  this  mouth;  more  than  the  promise  of  strength  in 

102 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

the  finely  cut  chin.  Her  thick  lashes  began  pure  gold,  but  changed 
then:  minds  abruptly  in  the  middle,  and  finished  jet  black.  . . . 

She  was  the  loveliest  thing  this  man's  eyes  had  ever  rested 
upon.  And  as  at  the  Beach,  he  seemed  to  begin  with  a  plunge: 

"Jack  Dalhousie's  gone  away,  Miss  Heth  —  gone  to  Wey- 
mouth,  Texas,  to  live.  I  had  a  letter  from  him,  day  before  yester 
day.  He 's  got  work  there,  on  a  stock-farm  —  among  strangers. 
He  has  n't  taken  a  drink  since  —  October.  He  's  making  a  new 
start,  with  nothing  to  remind  him  of  what 's  past.  I  ...  hope  he 
will  be  happy  yet." 

Carlisle's  breast  rose  and  fell.   "Why  do  you  tell  this  to  me?" 

"  Because,"  said  Vivian, "  I  've  felt  I  —  did  you  such  a  wrong  — 
that  night  ..." 

Under  the  flickering  Cooney  gas,  the  two  stood  staring  at  each 
other.  The  young  man  hurried  on: 

"I've  had  it  on  my  mind  ever  since,  and  have  wanted  very 
much  to  tell  you.  .  .  .  I  've  felt  that  —  what  I  —  I  said  to  you 
was  all  wrong — most  unjust.  ..." 

He  hesitated;  and  the  gold-and-black  lashes,  so  piquant  and 
gay,  fell.  "Take  your  jump!  Take  your  jump!"  called  Major 
Cooney  in  the  dining-room.  You  could  hear  him  plainly,  straight 
through  the  folding  doors.  And  young  V.  Vivian,  who  was  mer 
ciless  as  a  social  philosopher  but  somewhat  trusting  as  a  man, 
took  his  jump  with  a  will. 

"  I  was  much  upset  about  it  that  night  —  and  excited,  I  sup 
pose.  I  can't  account  for  —  for  what  I  said  in  any  other  way. 
I  've  hoped  for  the  opportunity  to  tell  you  .  .  .  Why,  of  course  I 
don't  believe  that  at  all.  ...  It  was  all  so  confused  and  mixed 
up;  that  was  the  trouble.  But  of  course  I  know  that  you  —  that 
you  would  n't  have  said  anything  that  —  that  was  n't  entirely 
consistent  with  the  facts.  .  .  ." 

He  paused,  expectantly  it  seemed;  but  there  came  no  reply. 

Cally  Heth,  indeed,  stood  in  a  dumbness  which  she  seemed 
powerless  to  break.  Well  she  knew  what  sort  of  reply  she  ought 
to  make  to  these  remarks:  what  was  the  man  saying  but  what 
she  had  already  said  a  hundred  times  to  herself?  He  was  simply 
making  tardy  admission  that  her  position  had  been  exactly 

103 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

right  all  along;  that  was  all.  Yet  somehow  the  sane  knowledge 
did  not  seem  to  help  much  against  this  sequence  of  unique 
sensations  she  was  at  present  experiencing,  —  odd,  tumultuous, 
falling  sensations,  as  of  bottoms  dropped  out.  .  .  . 

"I  suppose,"  said  the  man's  faraway  voice,  sounding  a  sudden 
loss  of  confidence,  "it's  rather  too  much  to  hope  that  —  that 
you  can  forget  ..." 

Again  his  words  dropped  into  the  brief,  expectant  silence.  .  .  . 
It  seemed  that  he  had  happened  to  say  the  one  thing  to  which  no 
reply  was  possible.  And  somehow  the  effect  of  it  was  worse,  even, 
than  the  never-forgotten  moment  in  the  summer-house. 

"And  forgive,"  finished  the  voice.  .  .  .  "  I  Ve  felt —  " 

And  then,  in  good  season,  there  sounded  welcome  footsteps, 
Hen's,  in  the  hall.  They  broke  at  a  stroke  the  strange  petrifying 
numbness  which  Carlisle  had  felt  mysteriously  closing  over  her. 
She  murmured  the  name  of  Henrietta,  and  turned  away.  And 
her  voice  was  the  voice  of  Lucknow,  as  the  friendly  columns 
poured  in.  ... 

Hen  came  walking  in,  saying  something  lively  and  Cooney- 
esque,  and  glancing  with  an  air  of  interested  expectancy  from  her 
friend  V.  V.  to  her  cousin  Cally.  But  Cally  only  said  once  more 
that  she  must  be  going,  and  asked  where  Aunt  Molly  was.  She 
then  let  fall  the  word  good-night  for  Hen's  caller,  while  looking 
at  a  point  some  ninety  degrees  removed  from  his  whereabouts: 
by  which  the  caller  understood  that  his  forgiveness  was  prob 
lematical,  to  say  the  least  of  it. 


IX 


Concerning  an  Abandoned  Hotel,  and  who  lived  there;  also  of  an 
Abandoned  Youth,  who  lived  somewhere  else,  Far  Away;  how  a 
Slum  Doctor  dressed  for  a  Function,  such  as  involved  Studs;  and 
how  Kern  Garland  wishted  she  was  a  Lady. 

MRS.  GARLAND,  catching  sight  of  Doctor  as  he  came 
up  the  decayed  grand- stairway,  cried  out,  well,  she 
never,  just  in  the  nig  of  time!  Why,  the  words  was  no 
more  'n  out  of  her  mouth  that  the  stoo  was  just  done  to  a 
hair,  she  did  declare,  and  Kern  she  said,  quick  as  anything, 
what,  a  hair  in  the  stoo,  now,  mommer,  that  'd  never  do.  ... 

The  clocks  of  the  city  had  just  struck  six  for  the  last  time  that 
year.  Dr.  Vivian,  having  placed  his  suitcase  and  overcoat  on  the 
second-hand  operating-table  in  the  office,  washed  face  and  hands, 
brushed  his  coat-collar  with  a  whisk  whose  rank  shad  been  heavily 
thinned  in  wars  with  dust  and  lint,  and,  repairing  in  sound 
spirits  to  the  Garland  combination  dining-  and  living-room,  with 
the  kitchen  in  the  corner,  made  his  interesting  confidence  relative 
to  the  suitcase.  He  made  it  in  mouth-filling  phrases,  with  many 
teasing  generalizations  about  the  ways  of  the  world  and  the  evils 
of  modern  society,  which  was  only  his  gempman's  way  when 
playful.  But  by  close  application  his  auditors  soon  got  at  the 
heart  of  his  meaning,  to  wit :  Doctor  actually  was  going  uptown 
to  his  swell  Uncle  Beirne's  swell  Noo  Year's  reception  to-night 
in  Mr.  O'Neill's  fulldressuit. 

Naturally  the  Garlands  were  much  interested  and  excited  by 
the  tidings,  which  brought  them  so  close  to  great  events  that, 
practically  speaking,  they  themselves  became  members  of  the 
fash'nable  set:  and  Mrs.  Garland  publicly  thanked  God  that  she 
was  not  as  other  women  were,  lazying  and  keeping  back  their 
gentlemen's  shirts  till  Saturday  night,  or  worse.  Laid  away  tidy 
in  the  second  bureau  drawer,  her  shirts  were.  The  doctor  himself 

I05 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

seemed  not  a  little  enlivened  by  the  evening's  prospect.  It  is 
imaginable  that  the  Dabney  House  grew  a  little  lonely  at 
times.  .  .  . 

"And  to  think  your  swell  uncle  wants  you  so  special,  sir!" 
said  Mrs.  Garland,  in  her  harsh,  inflectionless  voice.  "A  compli 
ment,  I  'm  sure.  And  his  party  all  a  fizzle  unless  you  come, 
and  his  gai'ty  a  mockery!  Well!" 

Such  indeed  was  the  way  in  which  Vivian  had  been  pleased 
to  depict  his  fashionable  uncle's  attitude.  He  smiled  slightly, 
sipped  his  feeble  coffee  and  said: 

"Bear  in  mind  that  he  's  a  bad,  bad  (though  personally  not 
displeasing)  old  man,  ridden  by  ruinous  ideas  about  the  al- 
mightiness  of  the  dollar,  or  lucre  as  we  term  it.  ...  I  have 
observed  for  some  time  that  he  desires  to  corrupt  me  with  his 
Persian  luxuries." 

"Persian!  Well,  I  never!" 

Mrs.  G.,  a  stout  woman  and  a  dress-reformer  by  the  look  of  her, 
got  hot  corn  muffins  from  the  kitchenette  in  the  corner,  and 
added: 

"Them  rugs  is  beautiful." 

"He  said  lux'ries,  mommer,  like  lowneg  dresses,  and  tcham- 
pagne,  and  ice-cream  all  like  animals,"  said  Kern. 

"I  do  declare!  Well,  they  do  say  the  mawls  of  some  of  them 
swells  is  something  nawful.  Not  alloodin'  to  your  uncle  now, 
well,  of  course,  sir." 

"I  know  a  girl  named  Sadie  Whirtle,"  continued  Kern,  "and 
there  was  a  man  named  Toatwood  made  a  lot  of  money,  corn- 
tracting,  and  his  wife  she  took  some  of  the  money  and  went  to 
Europe  in  a  steamer  and  stayed  more  'n  two  months  buying 
clo'es.  And  one  day  Sadie  Whirtle  goes  up  to  him  and  says, '  Mist' 
Toatwood,  hear  your  wife  's  come  home  with  some  fine  Parisian 
clo'es.'  And  Mist'  Toatwood  says,  'Shucks' — on 'y  he  says 
somep'n  worse  'n  shucks  —  'Shucks,'  says  he,  'why,  my  wife 
never  been  to  Persia  in  her  life.' " 

Kern  was  eighteen,  with  six  years  of  bread- winning  behind  her, 
but  she  told  her  story  exactly  in  the  manner  of  a  child  of  eight. 
That  is  to  say,  she  told  it  in  a  monotone  without  evincing,  and 

106 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


clearly  without  feeling,  the  slightest  amusement  in  it,  and  at  the 
end,  continuing  quite  grave,  watched  for  its  effect  on  others  with 
a  curious,  staring  interest.  Her  immobile,  investigatory  expres 
sion  made  the  doctor  laugh,  which  seemed,  of  late,  to  be  the 
object  in  life  of  all  Kern's  anecdotes. 

"Where  'd  you  get  that  story,  Corinne?" 

His  odd  habit  of  so-  calling  her  had  often  been  privately  dis 
cussed  between  Kern  and  her  mother,  who  had  so  long  ago 
shortened  their  own  original  Kurrin  that  even  that  had  passed 
from  memory.  They  had  concluded  that  this  was  only  one  of  his 
jokey  gempman's  ways. 

"Off  Sadie  Whirtle,"  said  Kern,  rocking  backward  and  for 
ward  in  her  chair.  "  On'y  I  don't  see  anything  comical  in  it." 

And  then  she  giggled  for  some  time. 

The  talk  and  stoo  went  forward  cheerfully.  Beside  the  Gold- 
nagels,  on  the  ground  floor,  these  two  women  were  the  doctor's 
only  fellow  lodgers,  for  Mister  Garland,  of  the  wanderlust,  had 
not  visited  his  family  since  the  day  in  October,  and  so  hardly 
counted.  In  the  early  weeks  of  the  doctor's  tenancy,  which  be 
gan  only  last  September,  he  had  walked  three  times  a  day  to 
the  Always  Open  Lunch  Room,  known  among  the  baser  sort 
as  the  Suicide  Club,  and  had  then  become  possibly  the  most 
discriminating  judge  of  egg-sandwiches  in  all  the  city.  Later, 
having  made  the  better  acquaintance  of  the  Garlands,  he  had 
rightly  surmised  that  the  earnings  derivable  from  a  medical 
boarder  might  not  be  unacceptable  in  that  quarter.  The  present 
modus  vivendi,  then  worked  out,  had  proved  most  satisfactory 
to  all,  from  both  the  financial  and  the  social  viewpoints. 

"I  wisht  I  had  a  red  satin  dress,  and  a  necklace  all  pearls,  and 
was  going  to  the  party,  too,  and  had  a  dark  sad-faced  man 
with  a  mustache  and  a  n eye-glass  engaged  to  me,  like  a  count. 
I  wisht  I  was  a  Lady,"  said  Kern. 

"You  don't  need  a  red  satin  dress  to  be  a  lady." 

"It'd  come  easier,  kinder,  with  the  dress,  Mr.  V.  V.  And 
I  wisht  I  had  a  writin'-desk,  too.  And  a  founting  pen." 

"  Lawk's  sakes,  Kern,  an'  I  've  asked  you  a  hundred  times  what 
would  you  do  with  a  writin'-desk,  now?" 

107 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Mommer,  I'd  set  at  it." 

"An'  what  time  you  got  for  settin',  I'd  like  to  know?  Fairy- 
dreamin'  again!" 

"  An'  I  'd  keep  notes  in  it  in  the  pigeon-holes.  Like  it  says  in 
my  Netiquette." 

"You  don't  get  no  notes." 

Kern  was  silenced  by  her  mother's  addiction  to  actuality,  but 
presently  said:  "I  'd  get  notes  if  I  was  a  lady,  would  n't  I,  Mr. 
V.  V.?" 

The  doctor  assured  her  that  she  would,  and  that  all  these 
things  would  come  some  day.  He  sighed  inwardly  and  wondered, 
not  for  the  first  time,  where  the  link  could  possibly  lie  between 
the  matter-of-fact  mother  and  the  strange  child  of  fancy.  There 
was  nothing  to  do  but  attribute  the  phenomenon  to  Mister,  the 
whimsical  knight  of  the  open  road.  The  boarder  asked  what  he 
should  bring  Kern  from  the  party:  he  feared  they  would  n't  have 
writing-desks,  it  not  being  at  all  a  literary  set.  The  girl  thought 
a  rapturous  moment  and  then  asked  could  she  have  three  of 
them  marrowglasses,  all  in  curly  white  paper. 

Vivian  promised,  and  departed  on  his  duties.  First  there  was 
a  call  at  the  Miggses'  down  the  block,  where  the  little  boy  Tub 
lay  with  scarlet  fever,  very  sick;  and  then  there  was  his  seven 
o'clock  office  hour  for  workers,  in  which  one,  a  teamster  with 
Bright's  disease  and  seven  children,  remained  long.  ... 

These  matters  occupied  the  doctor  till  eight  o'clock:  alone  in 
his  office  he  computed  the  fact  roughly  from  his  watch,  a  bat 
tered  heirloom  whose  word  was  not  to  be  taken  literally.  Good! 
—  half  an  hour  before  time  to  dress.  Leisure,  being  a  scant  com 
modity,  was  proportionally  valued.  The  young  man  advanced 
to  his  secretary,  before  whose  open  face  plain  living  and  high 
thinking  could  be  so  freely  indulged  in. 

The  secretary  was  of  fine  mahogany,  hand-made  in  Virginia  in 
the  year  that  Sir  Edward  Pakenham  did  not  take  New  Orleans. 
It  was  the  hero  of  so  many  travels  that  its  present  proprietor  once 
called  it  a  field-secretary,  a  pleasantry  which  would  doubtless 
have  convulsed  Miss  Mamie  Willis,  if  only  she  had  ever  heard  it. 
The  great  tall  office,  bare  but  for  cheap  doctorly  paraphernalia, 

108 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


was  even  more  storied.  A  bleak  grandeur  clung  to  it  still.  De 
cayed  mouldings  it  had  a  plenty:  great  splotches  on  wall  and 
ceiling,  where  plaster  had  been  tried  through  the  years  and  found 
wanting;  unsightlier  splotch  between  the  windows  whence  the 
tall  gilt  mirror  had  been  plucked  away  for  cash;  broken  chande 
lier,  cracked  panes,  loose  flooring,  dismantled  fireplace.  But  view 
the  stately  high  pitch  of  the  chamber,  the  majestic  wide  windows 
and  private  balcony  without,  the  tall  mantel  of  pure  black 
marble,  the  still  handsome  walnut  paneling,  waist-high,  the  mas 
sive  splendid  doors.  No  common  suburban  room,  this:  clearly  a 
room  with  meaning,  a  past,  soul. 

The  look  was  not  deceptive.  Royalty  had  on  a  time  sat  in 
this  room:  here  granted  audience  to  the  great's  higher  circle,  of 
greatness;  there,  beyond  that  door,  nowadays  admitting  ragged 
sufferers  from  a  fourth-class  "waiting-room,"  slept  in  state 
with  doubtless  royal  snores.  This,  in  fact,  was  the  old  Dabney 
House's  famous  "state  suite,"  Vivian's  office  the  culminating 
grand  sitting-room,  the  building  art's  best  in  the  '403.  A  fam 
ous  hostelry  the  Dabney  House  had  been  in  its  day,  the 
chosen  foregathering-place  of  notabilities  now  long  dusted  to 
the  common  level.  Hither  had  trooped  the  gallant  and  the  gay, 
the  knight  in  his  pride  and  beauty  in  her  power,  great  statesmen 
and  greater  belles,  their  lovers  and  their  sycophants.  Here,  in 
the  memorable  ball  still  talked  of  by  silvered  ladies  of  an  elder 
day,  the  Great  Personage  had  trod  his  measure  with  peerless 
Mary  Marshall. 

A  great  history  had  the  Dabney  House,  and  now  nothing  much 
else  beside.  Built  upon  a  flouting  of  a  common  law,  it  had  lived 
to  see  the  westward  course  of  progress,  deaf  to  sentiment  as  ever, 
kick  it  far  astern.  Long  since  had  the  world  of  fashion  deserted 
it  to  its  memories.  Desolate  and  mice-ridden  stood  the  fading 
pile  in  a  neighborhood  where  further  decay  was  hardly  possible, 
enveloped  by  failure  and  dirt  and  poverty,  misery  and  sin  and 
the  sound  of  unholy  revelry  by  night.  '  The  lion  and  the  liz 
ard  keep  the  courts  where  Jamshyd  gloried  and  drank  deep.'  And 
the  vast  moulded  corridors,  historied  with  great  names,  echoed 
to  the  feet  of  Garlands,  Vivians,  and  Goldnagels,  and  over  the 

109 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

boards  once  ennobled  by  the  press  of  royal  feet,  a  shabby  young 
man  sat  writing  into  a  book  with  a  villainous  pen,  as  follows: 

Rent  $12. 

Board  20. 

Laundry  3.25 

Dr.  Vivian  had,  in  short,  induced  himself  to  the  casting-up 
of  his  monthly  accounts,  a  task  of  weariness  and  travail.  As 
to-morrow  was  the  first  day  of  the  year,  it  was  natural  that 
he  should  thus  occupy  his  half-hour  of  leisure,  but  as  he  was 
unmethodical  by  nature  it  was  also  natural  that  he  should  be 
casting  up  the  account  for  November,  December  (which  included 
Christmas)  being  as  yet  unlocked  into.  Jottings  on  loose  bits  of 
paper  supplied  the  necessary  data,  or  did  n't,  as  the  case  might  be. 

The  young  man  scratched  his  head,  and  continued: 

Car-tickets  $1.25 

Tobacco  .40 

Soap  .15 

Shaving  ditto  .19 

Gas  2.40 

Pencils  .03 

"Aha!"  said  V.  Vivian,  after  a  considerable  interval;  and 
penned  triumphantly: 

Matches  .05 

Beads  (Corinne)  .49 

Followed  a  long  pause. 

On  the  opposite,  or  left-hand,  page  of  the  ledger  there  stood : 

Income  50. 

Receipts  6.40 

Total  56.40 

Vivian's  dead  father,  though  the  absent-minded  inventor  of  the 
turbine  that  would  never  quite  work,  had  somehow  contrived 
not  to  make  away  with  every  penny  of  his  wife's  Beirne  inher 
itance.  Very  few  unsuccessful  inventors  could  say  as  much. 

no 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

And  this  fact  accounted  for  the  complicating  term  "Income," 
whose  regular  presence  in  the  budget  was  certainly  a  trifle  awk 
ward  for  the  despiser  of  property,  aligning  him  out  of  hand 
with  the  wealthy  classes;  but  to  the  individual  was  undoubtedly 
most  comforting,  since  it  set  a  man  economically  free  forever. 
You  never  have  to  do  anything  for  money,  with  fifty  dollars  a 
month.  Receipts  were,  of  course,  moneys  taken  in  for  services 
rendered.  If  Vivian's  sick  insisted  on  paying  him  a  little  some 
thing  for  his  trouble,  he  thought  it  moral  not  to  restrain  them. 
However,  the  sick's  attitude  was  commonly  the  reverse  of  the 
above.  .  .  . 

Ignoring  "Receipts,"  as  a  highly  uncertain  quantity,  the 
scheme  of  income  and  outgo  commonly  left  a  net  monthly  bal 
ance  of  about  ten  dollars  for  works  of  a  philanthropic  nature. 
From  a  strictly  scientific  point  of  view,  the  budget  contained 
an  unsoundness,  in  that  it  allowed  nothing  for  depreciation  of 
plant,  so  to  say:  the  necessity  for  fresh  supplies  of  a  personal 
nature  really  was  not  duly  faced  in  it.  However,  the  doctor  had 
so  far  eliminated  all  expenditures  in  that  quarter,  save  only  for  a 
little  half-soling  matter  week  before  last.  He  was  confident  that 
it  would  all  work  out  very  satisfactorily  when  occasion  arose. 

The  trial  balance  to-night  developed  a  shortage  of  $1.22. 
Before  the  budgeteer  could  precisely  place  it,  his  attention  be 
came  diverted  by  something  else,  to  return  no  more  that  even 
ing.  Having  drawn  a  stray  sheet  of  paper  toward  him  to  scribble 
on  it  "Milk  for  Miggs,"  he  was  caught  and  engrossed  by  other 
inscriptions  on  the  sheet,  noted  down  in  the  early  forenoon. 
They  ran: 

Heth  Works  (Pickle)  Art  in  Factory  Worker 

See  Mr.  Dayne  —  Settlement  —  Begin  canvass  not 

before  Feb.  I.  H.  Cooney 
Todd  Inst.  —  Night  School? 
Socks?  —  Or  darning 

Playground.   (Council  Com.  meets  Fri.  5  P.M.) 
Jack  D. 
Mrs.  G.  Loan  2oc. 

in 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Through  the  next  to  the  last  item,  Vivian  absently  drew  a 
pencil  mark,  the  weekly  cheering  letter  to  Weymouth,  Texas, 
having  been  written  just  after  the  memorandum.  However,  the 
young  man's  eye  remained  fixed  on  the  item  erased.  He  lit  his 
pipe,  took  his  head  in  both  hands  and  continued  to  stare.  .  .  . 

Dalhousie  had  called  at  the  Dabney  House  on  the  night  of  his 
departure  for  the  new  country.  His  reappearance  in  the  flesh 
proved  at  least  that  that  fierce  instability  of  character,  which 
betrays  men  in  moments  of  disaster  to  the  irreparable  rashness, 
was  not  in  him.  So  much  was  a  comfort,  for  the  witch  fear  had 
ridden  Vivian  in  the  silent  weeks  following  the  Beach. 

But  the  reparting  was  a  heart-rack  none  the  less.  Dalhousie 
was  no  lifelong  friend  like  O'Neill,  or  even  like  Chas  Cooney.  But 
Vivian,  having  made  his  acquaintance  most  informally  one  night 
in  the  summer,  had  responded  at  sight  to  the  unconscious 
claim  of  weakness;  he  had  come  to  feel  a  strong  bond,  con 
ceived  splendid  reformatory  plans.  The  boy's  fall  and  dis 
grace,  coming  like  a  crash  from  the  blue,  had  been  a  severe  shock 
to  him,  which  would  last.  His  self-exile,  while  probably  ad 
visable  for  a  time  at  least,  had  been  a  prospect  full  of  sadness. 
If  poor  Dalhousie  had,  woven  into  him,  a  vitiating  twist  for  self- 
dramatization,  if  he  said,  "My  God,  why  can't  I  die?"  less  with 
the  terrible  dignity  of  ruin  than  like  a  lad  portraying  his  idea  of 
ruin  on  the  stage,  his  native  missing  of  the  utter  ring  of  truth 
never  occurred  to  Vivian.  To  him  this  boy,  broken  for  cowardice 
and  cast  off  by  his  father  and  friends,  was  as  tragic  a  figure  as 
GEdipus. 

And  what  made  the  farewell  so  peculiarly  sad  was  that  Dal, 
out  of  his  painful  bewilderment,  was  evidently  still  clinging  to 
some  sort  of  hope.  He  himself  had  said,  and  said  again,  that 
there  was  no  hope  for  such  as  he.  He  admitted  with  bitter 
ness  his  insane  passion  that  sunny  afternoon;  remembered  and 
acknowledged  a  wild  impulse  to  overturn  the  boat,  and  let  come 
what  might.  He  paced  the  floor  and  cried  out  that  nothing  that 
they  said  of  him  could  be  too  bad.  And  yet  he  hoped.  He  had 
come  to  the  Dabney  House  with  hope.  He  had  given  his 
Texas  address  with  a  falter  of  hope. 

112 


V.  .V.'s     Eyes 


But  of  course  there  was  no  hope.  Drink,  the  great  fowler,  had 
bagged  one  more.  .  .  . 

Without,  there  rose  a  lonesome  booming,  far  and  ghostly  in 
the  stillness  of  the  great  empty  hotel.  It  was  the  Garlands' 
crazy  clock,  memento  of  Mister  in  his  prodigal  bridal  days. 
Harried  forever  by  some  obscure  intestinal  disorder,  the  mad 
timepiece  stayed  voiceless  for  days  together,  and  then,  without 
warning,  embarked  upon  an  orgy  of  profligate  strikings.  Now  it 
struck  fourteen,  and  fell  abruptly  silent. 

Vivian  stirred,  and  remembered  the  reception.  His  uncle,  who 
derided  and  castigated  his  Dabney  House  career,  had  said  em 
phatically  that  he  would  consider  it  most  disrespectful  if  his 
solitary  nephew  absented  himself  from  the  annual  greeting  of 
friends.  The  nephew,  since  his  home-coming,  had  grown  very 
fond  of  the  old  gentleman.  Yet  he  knew  quite  well  that  he  was  n't 
giving  up  this  evening  solely  to  please  his  uncle. 

He  rose,  relit  his  pipe,  and  walked  about.  Though  useful 
bones  were  missing  from  his  left  foot,  he  liked  to  walk:  was 
rather  an  accomplished  pedestrian.  In  time  he  came  to  a  halt 
before  a  dilapidated  little  cabinet  partly  full  of  the  shiny  tools 
of  his  trade.  The  cabinet  seemed  quite  out  of  place  in  the  tall 
state  chamber:  but  then  so  did  the  man.  He  did  not  look  in  the 
least  like  a  doctor  (just  as  Miss  Heth  had  said).  The  faint 
scent  of  iodoform  that  he  now  gave  off  was  a  heterogeneity, 
.like  a  whiff  of  brandy  on  a  parson. 

The  young  man  stood  gazing  into  his  cabinet,  fathoms  deep  in 
thought.  That  Miss  Heth  was  responsible  for  a  meaningless  lie 
which  took  away  more  than  life  itself  from  one  who  had  loved 
her  truly  in  his  way:  this  was  a  hypothesis  so  wild  and  weak 
that  it  collapsed  at  the  first  opportunity  for  calm,  just  exami 
nation.  The  sight  of  her  again,  the  other  night,  had  merely 
clinched  the  matter;  driven  by  a  glance  the  last  nail  in  the  coffin 
of  Dalhousie's  hope;  and  by  the  same  stroke,  swept  away  the 
last  lingering  trace  of  diabolical  suspicion.  But  that  Miss  Heth 
had  treated  Dal  pretty  badly  before  the  Beach  was  only  too 
probable.  The  boy's  bitter  complainings  had  left  small  doubt 
of  that. 

"3 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

It  is  a  world  in  which  we  must  be  just  before  we  are  generous. 
Unfortunately,  there  could  be  little  question  that  this  girl  with 
the  heavenly  face  had  a  certain  touch  —  should  we  say?  —  of 
earthy  hardness  in  her,  a  certain  induration  of  the  spirit.  She 
had  shown  it  quite  plainly  in  her  general  attitude  toward  Dal 
in  the  hour  of  his  need.  She  had  shown  it  again,  in  a  sort  of  way, 
in  her  attitude  toward  the  Works. 

Not,  indeed,  in  her  resentment  at  his  letter.  Anything  but 
resentment  there  would  have  been  unnatural,  not  to  say  inhuman 
and  despisable,  in  a  daughter.  Of  course  no  girl  worth  a  pinch  of 
salt  would  allow  you  to  stand  up  and  say  that  her  father  was  a 
shameless  homicide.  Her  anger  there  did  her  the  greatest  credit : 
showed  beyond  doubt  that  she  was  absolutely  sound  at  heart. .  . . 
Trouble  was,  of  course,  that  she  did  n't  know  anything  about  the 
Works,  and  did  n't  want  to  know.  She  supposed  that  those 
scores  of  girls  who  went  daily  to  her  father's  bunching-room  had 
nothing  to  do  with  her. 

The  night  was  cold;  V.  Vivian  stood  warming  his  hands  over 
a  second-hand  gas-stove,  which  leaked  perceptibly.  .  .  .  Great 
heavens,  how  could  it  possibly  be  otherwise?  Was  not  this  the 
way  of  all  the  world?  Let  a  little  prosperity  come  to  a  poor 
peasant,  and  the  first  thing  he  did  was  to  stop  eating  five 
from  the  same  bowl.  That  was  Tolstoy;  and  that  was  the  way, 
through  all  peoples  and  all  times,  riches  had  meant  segregation 
from  the  Common.  .  .  .  Round  and  round  them  pulsed  the  great 
warm  tide  of  real  life,  and,  stung  by  this  mad  blindness,  men 
sweated  and  fought  their  lives  away  trying  to  scramble  up 
out  of  the  enriching  stream  upon  a  sterile  little  island.  You 
could  almost  have  forgiven  them  if  they  were  happy  upon  their 
island.  But  happiness  is  born  in  the  heart,  and  they  who  seek 
it  elsewhere  in  the  end  hold  Sodom  apples  in  fingers  through 
which  the  pearl  of  great  price  has  somewhere  slipped  on  the 
way.  .  .  . 

"Mr.  V.  V.!  Ain't  you  dressing  yet!11  said  a  voice  from  with 
out.  "Mommer  says  remind  you  it's  after  nine  o'clock." 

The  tall  young  man  came  to  earth  with  a  thud.  A  startled 
frown  gathered  quickly  on  his  brow. 

114 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"What? ...  Then  I'm  late  indeed.  Nine  o'clock!  I  don't 
see  how  it's  possible " 

He  seized  Commissioner  O'Neill's  suitcase  from  the  operating- 
table,  with  a  panic  show  of  hurry. 

Kern's  voice  took  on  a  cheering  inflection. 

"Don't  you  mind,  Mr.  V.  V.  All  the  swells  '11  be  late.  D'  you 
want  me  to  help  you,  sir?  Don't  you  want  me  put  in  your 
studs  'r  something?" 

Mr.  V.  V.  set  down  the  suitcase,  dealt  a  mortal  blow. 

"I  have  no  studs,"  he  said,  in  a  quiet,  scared  way. 

A  little  exclamation  without  was  followed  by:  "Can  I  come 
in,  sir?" 

"Yes,  yes;  come  in.  But  this  is  rather  serious.  I  confess  I  — 
don't  see  how  it's  going  to  work  out.  .  .  ." 

The  door  opened  and  Kern  tripped  in  with  a  little  kick,  and 
a  flash  and  tinkle  of  jewelry  at  neck  and  waist.  She  never  merely 
walked  when  it  was  possible  to  dance. 

"  My  regular  shirts,"  said  the  young  man,  standing  on  the  floor 
and  brushing  his  hair  with  a  worried  hand,  "have  the  buttons 
sewed  on,  of  course.  .  .  .  Seems  to  me  O'Neill  might  have 
thought  of  this  contingency." 

Kern  repressed  a  desire  to  giggle  at  Doctor's  air  of  help 
lessness,  and  controlled  her  itching  feet.  She  was  not  wanting 
in  the  resourcefulness  of  the  poor. 

"I'll  get  you  studs,  Mr.  V.  V.,"  said  she,  eagerly.  "Less  see 
now  —  where '11  I  get  'em?.  .  .  I'll  get  'em  at  Lazarus's  — 
that's  where!  I  '11  have  'em  here  in  five  minutes,  and  right  in 
your  shirt." 

Lazarus?  Why,  they  shut  up  at  six  o'clock.  Yes,  but  Willie 
Walter,  he  slept  behind  the  counter,  and  was  abed  right  now,  on 
account  of  getting  up  so  early.  Just  let  her  bang  the  door  in  the 
alley  a  couple  of  times,  that  was  all.  Moreover,  Walter  being 
obliging,  it  agreeably  developed  that  the  studs  would  come  as  a 
temporary  loan,  if  desired.  An  evening's  wear  out  of  them,  and 
then  back  on  the  card  and  into  stock  again,  the  same  as  new, 
and  nobody  the  wiser.  Lazarus  would  do  the  same. 

"It 's  very  nice  of  you,  Corinne,"  said  the  young  man,  pick- 
US 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


ing  up  the  suitcase  again.  "Something  in  pearl  or  plain  gold, 
perhaps.  Come  straight  back  now.  I  don't  like  at  all  for  you  to 
be  running  the  streets  at  night  — " 

"Maybe  I  won't  come  back  at  all,"  said  Kern,  improvising 
a  barn  dance  about  the  long  office.  "Maybe  I'll  run  off  with  a 
count  and  go  to  Europe  on  a  steamer  like,  and  have  mand'lins 
played  under  my  winder  by  moonlight,  and  sit  at  a  gool'  writin'- 
desk  all  day  and  make  up  po'try." 

"That  would  be  rather  hard  on  the  count,  wouldn't  it?" 
said  Mr.  V.  V.,  absently;  and  added  at  once:  "What  makes 
you  do  that?" 

"Stitch  in  me  side,"  said  she,  impishly.  " Machineetis,  7  call  it. 
Like  'pendicitis,  y'  know?  It's  gone  now.  I  don't  get  tired 
when  I  dance." 

Kern  had  a  quantity  of  dark  brown  hair,  covered  now  by  a 
picture  hat  supporting  a  base  red  imitation  of  a  willow  plume ; 
she  put  on  the  hat  every'night  nowadays,  whether  she  was  going 
out  or  not.  By  two  years'  steady  practice  she  was  esteemed  one 
of  the  best  operatives  in  the  Heth  Cheroot  Works ;  but  her  new 
passion  in  life  was  to  learn  from  Mr.  V.  V.  what  it  was  to  be  a 
lady.  Dearly  as  Kern  loved  beads,  pins,  buckles,  and  all  that 
shone  and  glittered,  her  particular  desire  for  Christmas  had  been 
a  Netiquette  and  Complete  Letter  Writer,  and  this  Mr.  V.  V. 
had  duly  obtained  for  her,  though  it  had  run  to  a  dollar  and  a 
quarter.  The  little  girl  might  have  been  any  age  or  no  age;  she 
was  unformed  for  her  years,  somewhat  elfin  of  countenance,  and 
thin  in  the  cheek.  On  one  of  these  cheeks,  Dr.  Vivian  now  laid 
the  back  of  his  hand,  and  told  Kern  to  stick  out  her  tongue.  She 
did  it  as  she  did  everything  (except  cheroot-making),  like  a  game, 
sticking  it  out  much  farther  than  was  necessary  and  repeatedly 
winking  her  left  eye. 

Vivian  set  down  the  suitcase  again. 

"You  go  to  bed,"  said  he.   "I  '11  attend  to  the  studs." 

Kern  stuck  back  her  tongue  and  unwinked  her  eye,  with  some 
thing  like  consternation. 

"I  feel  very  well,  Mr.  V.  V.  —  honest!  I'll  get  'em  and  come 
straight  back,  sir,  —  truly,  truly!" 

116 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


The  young  man  reached  for  his  overcoat.  "I  don't  want  you 
to  go  out  to-night.  It 's  just  the  same  as  if  you  did  it  for  me, 
because  you  want  to  do  it.  That 's  what  counts.  Now  go  on  to 
bed.  You  aren't  well  at  all,  I  fear." 

Kern  turned,  much  depressed.  "It  was  me  thought  of  Willie 
Walter.  I  think  you  might  lemme." 

"You  must  do  what  I  say,  Corinne." 

"Ain't  I  doin'  it,  no  matter  how  hard  it  is,  sir?" 

"Don't  call  me  sir,  I  Ve  told  you." 

Kern  sadly  retired.  However,  she  did  not  do  exactly  what  Mr. 
V.  V.  said.  When,  after  forty  minutes  of  storm  and  stress,  he 
emerged  from  his  bedroom  and  shouted  to  Mrs.  Garland  to 
come  and  see  him  if  she  liked,  Kern,  too,  came  running  down 
the  hall,  still  in  her  hat.  Her  interest  in  the  gay  evening  being 
so  peculiarly  strong,  Vivian  did  not  have  the  heart  to  scold  her 
very  hard,  especially  as  she  cried  ahead  the  promise  to  go  to  bed 
the  very  minute  he  was  gone.  And  it  might  be  that  he  was 
secretly  rather  glad  to  have  his  little  friend  see  him  in  his  splendid 
regalia. 

He  stood  under  the  chandelier  in  his  decaying  chamber,  re 
volving  himself  with  complacence  for  the  Garlands'  inspection. 
It  was  O'Neill's  old  suit  that  he  had  borrowed,  which,  as  the 
Honorable  Commissioner  had  pointed  out,  really  made  a  much 
better  fit  than  the  costly  brand-new  one  just  from  Begg's.  At  the 
first  sight  of  their  boarder  in  it,  the  two  women  cried  out  with 
pleasure,  likening  him  to  dooks  and  dashing  villains  on  the  stage, 
well  seen  by  them  from  upper  galleries  of  the  past.  But  with 
the  dying  of  the  first  enthusiastic  burst,  Kern,  the  connoisseur, 
who  had  herself  been  clasped  by  gentlemen's  fulldressuits  at 
union  hops,  developed  a  more  searching  tendency.  By  the  elbow 
she  incited  the  doctor  to  keep  on  rotating. 

"There  's  something  wrong,  sir,  Mr.  V.  V.,  but  I  can't  make  out 
just  what  it  is." 

"It's  these  shoes,"  said  Mr.  V.  V.,  frankly.  "I  really  ought  to 
have  patent  leathers  to  look  like  the  rest  of  the  bloods,  but 
these  '11  do  very  nicely,  when  I  have  them  well  shined  up.  I  '11 
stop  by  the  stand  at  Ninth  Street." 

117 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"This  spot  right  in  front  of  the  coat  don't  look  so  very  good," 
said  Kern,  scratching  it  with  a  small  finger,  which  only  whitened 
it  up. 

"Shuh,  Kern!  That!"  said  Mrs.  Garland,  who  had  seen  the 
spot,  but  decided  to  say  nothing  about  it.  "Why,  hot  suds  and 
a  drop  ammonia  '11  fade  it  out  like  sunshine,  and  nobody  never 
know  't  was  there.  Wait  till  I  get  my  pan  now,  Doctor." 

"I  wisht  the  coat  could  set  a  little  snugger  round  your  neck, 
Mr.  V.  V.  But  mercy,  who  cares,  when  you  look  so  beautiful 
anyway !  And  you  '11  have  the  most  beautiful  lady  and  set  and 
talk  to  her,  won't  you,  Mr.  V.  V.?" 

"Stranger  things  have  happened,  my  dear  Corinne!" 

"There  '11  be  roses  and  violets  and  little  pink  lights  and  chick 
ing  salad  and  conservatories  and  f  ountings  all  lit  up.  And  what  '11 
you  and  her  talk  about,  Mr.  V.  V.,  with  the  band  playing  kind 
of  soft  and  settin'  behind  some  rubber-plants  like?" 

"Probably  something  for  her  own  good,"  said  Mr.  V.  V.,  with 
a  close-set  mouth;  leaving  Kern  to  reflect  that  that  was  a  funny 
way  to  talk  at  a  party. 

Mrs.  Garland  rushed  in  with  a  steaming  pan,  and  plumped 
down  on  her  knees  at  the  unshone  feet.  The  little  girl  prattled 
on.  But  the  tall  doctor,  on  his  own  word,  had  relapsed  abruptly 
into  a  brown  study.  .  .  . 

"It  sags  a  little  in  front,"  Kern  was  saying.  " Lemme  just  get 
my  hand  on  the  buckle  a  minute.  Mr.  V.  V.,  what  makes  you 
look  so  mad,  kind  of?" 

The  young  man  started  a  little. 

"I  was  thinking,"  said  he,  "that  life  is  hard  at  times." 

"It 's  truth,  Doctor.  .  .  .  Had  n't  his  negtie  ought  to  be  tight 
ened  up  a  weeny  bit,  Kern,  now?"  said  Mrs.  Garland  harshly, 
staring  up  from  her  adoring  position.  "  Not  but  7  think  the  shine 
of  his  gool'  collar-button  ain't  pretty.  ..." 

When  Mr.  V.  V.  and  his  gala  raiment  were  gone,  Kern 
skipped  into  his  bedroom  and  hastily  tackled  the  marked  dis 
order  there  prevalent.  She  thought  that  an  extra  minute  or  so 
stolen  for  this  purpose  would  not  really  be  so  very  wrong.  Care 

"8 


THERE  'S  SOMETHING  WRONG,  SIR,  MR.  V.  V. 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


of  the  rooms  was  strictly  included  in  the  boarder's  twenty  dol 
lars  a  month,  but  Kern  was  not  thinking  of  it  that  way  exactly. 

"Mommer,  what  makes  him  have  that  kinder  sorry  look  all 
the  time,  I  wonder?  "  she  said,  when  Mrs.  Garland  followed  her  in. 

"  Sorry,  what  you  talkin'  about?  A  pleasanter  spoke  gemp- 
man  I  never  see.  Hand  me  them  pants." 

"I'll  fold 'em,  mommer.  —  I  don't  mean  speakin',  but  the 
look  he's  got,  just  the  same  when  he's  laughin'  and  jokin'  and 
all.  It's  the  look  he's  got,  don't  you  notice,  someway?" 

"It's  that  foot  o'  his,  I  reckon.  Pains  him  prob'ly.  The 
mess  he's  left  things  ...  He'd  ought  to  have  a  fulldressuit  of 
his  own,  'stead  o'  borrowin'  that  fat  O'Neill's." 

"Mommer,  if  he  had  one,  somebody  'd  ask  it  off  him.  Like  he 
gave  Mister  his  Sunday  cutaway  coat.  .  .  .  How  'd  he  hurt  his 
foot,  mommer,  jever  hear  him  say?" 

"Berkler  bone, /hear." 

They  worked  in  silence  for  a  time. 

"I'm  right  tired  to-night.  Put  'em  here  in  his  clo'es-bag, 
mommer.  .  .  .  Don't  seem  it  could  be  just  his  foot.  Torm  Hart- 
man's  leg's  right  off  to  his  hip,  and  he's  got  a  fat  look  to  him. 
Mr.  V.  V.  's  sorry  like  he  wanted  to  do  something,  and  some 
thing  in  him  knewed  all  the  time  he  couldn't  ever." 

"Somep'n  in  him  knewed  —  jever  hear  such  foolishness!  I'll 
take  the  broom  to  this  floor.  You  go  along  to  bed  now.  Did  n't 
I  hear  you  promise  him?" 

"Mommer,  I'm  going.  Only  I  druther  of  went  to  the  party," 
said  Kern. 


A  Beautiful  New  Year's  Party,  and  who  spoiled  it,  and  how;  how 
Something  is  done,  after  all,  for  she  tells  the  Man  plainly  that  he 
must  n't  speak  to  her  any  more. 

BY  eleven  o'clock  the  festivities  approached  their  height: 
even  the  ultra-fashionable  had  arrived,  even  the  ultra-con 
servative  had  not  departed  for  bed.  The  affair  was  none 
of  your  wholesale  routs.  Old  Mr.  Beirne,  who  had  long  claimed 
the  eve  of  the  New  Year  for  the  hospitable  repayment  of  his  so 
cial  dues,  had  lived  to  see  the  list  of  his  friends  shrink  fast  as  Old 
Years  ticked  out.  Nevertheless,  the  scene  now  was  indubitably 
inspiriting.  Lively  groups  decorated  all  the  purview.  White 
shirt-fronts  gleamed:  white  shoulders  did  the  same.  The  fra 
grance  of  flowers  filled  the  air,  filled  likewise  with  the  gay  hum 
of  voices.  From  behind  a  coppice  of  shrub  and  palm  Professor 
Wissner's  band  of  select  artists  continually  seduced  the[  feet. 
Toward  the  dining-room  regions  rose  the  sounds  of  refined  con 
viviality.  Servitors  moved  about  with  trays.  Mrs.  Clicquot's 
product  fizzed,  for  the  proper  ceremonious  induction  of  another 
year. 

It  was  a  most  enlivening  ensemble,  full  of  pleasant  attrac 
tions  to  the  senses;  and  through  it  moved  Carlisle  Heth,  the  most 
beautiful  lady,  with  a  look  like  that  of  a  queen  in  a  book.  In  that 
gay  company  she  was  the  proudest  figure,  the  object  of  all  most 
captivating  to  the  eye,  save  one;  and  that  one,  an  Olympian  in 
evening  dress,  sauntered  splendidly  at  her  side. 

Mr.  Canning  to-night  made  his  debut  in  the  local  gay  world. 
Constant  as  had  been  his  attentions  for  a  number  of  days,  he 
had  hitherto  held  steadfastly  to  his  valetudinarian  stand  against 
general  society.  He  had  gambolled,  indeed,  but  he  had  gam 
bolled  strictly  a  deux.  In  his  present  willingness  to  break  through 
his  invalid  rules,  and  appear  as  her  acknowledged  squire  before 

1 20 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

the  flower  of  her  world,  Carlisle's  heart  had  recognized  the  crown 
ing  proof  of  his  interest.  Small  wonder  if  in  prospect  this  vic 
torious  evening  had  been  starred  in  her  mind  in  purple  and 
gold.  .  .  . 

The  shining  pair  had  just  arrived,  lateness  being  reckoned  very 
differently  in  Houses  of  Heth  and  Houses  of  Dabney.  Their  bril 
liant  progress  down  the  long  gay  room,  stopped  often  for  the  giv 
ing  and  taking  of  greetings,  left  behind  a  wake  of  sotto-wce  com 
pliment.  Cally  Heth,  though  the  familiar  sight  of  every  day,  was 
a  spectacle,  or  view,  not  easily  tired  of.  In  a  company  in  which 
most  had  known  each  other  from  birth,  her  distinguished  stranger 
and  captive  naturally  drew  even  keener  interest. 

"Look,  there  he  is!"  whispered  an  excited  debutante.  "Oh, 
what  a  dream!  .  .  ." 

"I  never  saw  Cally  look  better.  If  she  were  only  a  little  taller, 
what  a  match  they'd  make."  (This  was  Cally's  second-best 
friend  Evelyn  McVey,  herself  a  tall  girl.) 

"  Wissner  ought  to  hit  up  that  well-known  snatch  from '  Lohen 
grin'  ..  .;" 

"Certainly,  Mrs.  Bronson.  Delighted  to  introduce  you — in 
troduce  him,  that  is.  Just  a  little  later,  though.  Wouldn't  have 
me  interrupt  that,  would  you?" 

Thus  faithful  Willie  Kerr,  somewhat  harassed  by  the  respon 
sibilities  of  being  next  friend  to  a  crown  prince. 

Backbiting  among  the  well-bred  murmurs  there  was  of  course. 
Mrs.  Berkeley  Page,  the  hostile  one  who  had  made  the  remark 
about  the  Heths  being  very  improbable  people,  naturally  spoke 
in  her  characteristic  vein.  She  made  her  observations  to  her 
great  crony,  Mr.  Richard  Marye,  who  plucked  a  glass  of  cham 
pagne  from  a  beckoned  lackey,  and  answered: 

"Whoever  conceived  a  Canning  to  be  an  anchorite?  .  .  .  My 
dear,  why  are  you  so  severe  with  these  very  excellent  and  worthy 
people?" 

"Is  it  severe,"  said  the  lady,  "  to  refuse  to  be  cozened  by  gay 
lips  and  dramatic  hair?  " 

"Aspiration,"  mused  her  elderly  friend,  sipping  comfortably, 
"is  the  mainspring  of  progress.  Don't  you  admire  on  ward  and 

121 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


upward?  What  harm  can  a  little  climbing  possibly  do  to  you  and 
me?" 

"Oh,  Mr.  Dick!  All  the  harm  that  the  tail  does  when  it  begins 
to  wag  the  dog.  Don't  you  observe  how  these  people  set  up  their 
own  standards,  and  get  them  accepted,  whatever  old  fogies  like 
you  and  me  may  say?  They  unsoul  us  —  that's  what  they  do, 
and  we  may  scream,  but  we  can't  stop  them.  Their  argument  is 
that  money  can  do  everything,  and  the  intolerable  part  of  it  is 
that  they  prove  it.  Ah,  me!  —  " 

"Also,  O  temperament!  O  Moriarty!  For  my  part,  Mary,  I'm 
a  Democrat  —  " 

"You're  an  old-fashioned  Church  of  England  man,  and  inci 
dentally  a  great  dear,"  said  Mary  Page.  "And  nothing  on  earth 
sickens  you,  and  you  know  it,  like  this  godless  modern  material 
ism  .  .  ." 

But  who  could  smile  more  unaffectedly  than  Cally  Heth  at 
the  bitter  little  peckings  with  which  the  dying  order  ever  seeks 
to  avenge  itself  on  its  brilliant  supplanters?  She  passed  on  down 
the  long  room,  stunning  admirer  in  her  train.  High  hope  beck 
oned  imminently  to-night.  By  the  subtle  intuitions  of  her  sex 
she  had  been  notified  that  the  steady  approach  of  the  symbol  of 
her  happiness  consummate  now  quickened  toward  its  shining 
end.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Hugo  Canning,  having  returned  for  a  week  at  most,  had 
already  remained  for  a  fortnight.  And  it  was  obviously  for  her 
sake  that  he  had  lingered.  Day  by  day,  emerging  from  his 
Payne  barricades,  he  had  sought  her  out:  loud  his  feet  had  thun 
dered  behind,  with  no  more  promptings  of  hers.  Of  the  genuine 
ness  of  his  interest  she  could  feel  no  trace  of  doubt:  a  score  of 
"passages"  since  the  interesting  moment  in  Willie's  sitting- 
room  rose  to  the  eye  of  memory.  And  the  prince  of  partis 
attracted  her  no  less  compellingly.  On  nearer  view,  he  had 
revealed  himself  as  full  of  a  fascinating  contrariety,  various  as  a 
woman.  Moods  played  up  and  down  upon  him,  charming  mys 
teriously.  He  could  be  distrait  and  silent,  the  portrait  of  dis 
tinguished  boredom.  And  then,  as  by  the  turning  of  a  sudden 
page,  he  was  gay  again,  tender,  witty,  all  ardors.  .  .  . 

122 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


More  than  the  strains  of  the  lovesick  waltz  beat  in  the  girl's 
veins  to-night.  For  this  present  there  was  no  hope  even  of  con 
nected  conversation.  In  the  midst  of  the  gay  company  the  in 
vasions  of  privacy  were  constant. 

"All  these  nice  people,  and  all  so  eager  to  be  friendly  with 
you!"  laughed  Carlisle,  with  some  want  of  naturalness,  as  she 
for  the  dozenth  time  detached  herself  and  him  from  a  little 
surrounding  group.  "And  yet  you've  complained  to  me  of 
loneliness!" 

"There  are  times,  Miss  Heth,  when  one  is  never  so  lonely  as 
in  the  midst  of  the  crowd." 

"Oh!  .  .  .  Then  to  save  you  from  loneliness  to-night  I  must 
remove  you  from  the  crowd?" 

"You  grasp  my  meaning.  I  want  a  lodge  in  some  vast  wilder 
ness." 

"  That  is  rather  rude,  is  n't  it?  Where  should  I  come  in?  " 

"You  come  into  the  lodge,"  said  Canning,  and  smiled  faintly. 

Though  the  smile  was  faint,  her  eyes  fell  before  it.  When  she 
raised  them,  they  ran  upon  another  interruption. 

"This  is  Mrs.  Mason,  Mr.  Beirne's  sister.  You  will  like  to 
meet  her,  Mr.  Canning." 

"Delightful,"  murmured  Mr.  Canning. 

Because  of  his  consistent  recluseness,  foregone  to-night  for 
her  pleasure,  Carlisle  had  meant  rather  to  exhibit  Mr.  Canning 
to  enraptured  eyes  than  to  subject  him  to  a  flood  of  undesired 
introductions.  But  because  she  did  not  want  people  to  refer  to 
her  as  catty  behind  her  back,  some  sharing  of  her  honors  was 
inescapable.  A  few  of  her  dearest  girl-friends,  a  handful  of  the 
more  prominent  young  men,  a  somewhat  larger  sprinkling  of  the 
older  people:  these  were  all  who  received  the  golden  benediction. 
Evey  McVey  was  of  course  among  the  favored  few,  but  Mattie 
Allen,  as  usual  so  late  in  the  evening,  was  not  to  be  seen.  She  was 
undoubtedly  "off"  somewhere,  probably  high  up  on  the  stairs, 
with  the  most  interesting  man  she  had  been  able  to  attach. 

Canning  accepted  all  the  introductions  with  a  charming  cour 
tesy,  but  Carlisle  detected  beneath  his  agreeable  manner  a  faint 
undercurrent  of  stoic  weariness.  The  cold  weather  had  lately 

123 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


touched  the  troublesome  throat:  Mr.  Canning  spoke  to-night 
with  perceptible  hoarseness.  Carlisle  assured  him  that  he  had 
won  a  permanent  place  in  Foxe's  "Book  of  Martyrs"  (of  which 
she  had  heard  the  other  day),  and  invited  him  to  partake  of  re 
freshments,  for  they  had  now  at  last  reached  the  doors  of  the  din 
ing-room.  He  declined,  as  she  had  done,  but  accepted  a  glass  of 
champagne  from  a  bald-headed  Greek  who  was  pulling  corks  at  a 
small  table  near  by.  On  the  point  of  pledging  his  lady's  health, 
he  was  invaded  again,  this  time  by  resolute  Mr.  Robert  Tellford, 
who  held  the  opinion  that  Carlisle  looked  an  angel  this  evening, 
and  was  long  since  addicted  to  celestial  society. 

"The  wine  is  excellent,"  said  Mr.  Canning,  clinking  glasses 
with  Mr.  Tellford. 

"The  rooms  are  warm,"  said  Robert,  in  about  that  sequence. 

"People  are  beginning  to  leave,  I  observe,"  said  Mr.  Can 
ning. 

"Others  are  just  coming  in,  I  note,"  answered  Robert,  dog 
gedly. 

Carlisle  laughed.  "To-morrow  will  be  a  fine  day.  You  talk 
like  people  in  a  play.  Let 's  all  wish  each  other  a  happy  New 
Year " 

"Duty  is  done,"  she  added  later,  with  a  small  sigh,  when 
Robert  had  been  persuaded  to  remove  himself.  "We  can  now 
give  ourselves  up  to  lives  of  the  grossest  selfishness.  .  .  .  Oh, 
oh,  oh!  .  .  .  How  would  sitting  down  appeal  to  you,  Mr.  Can 
ning?" 

"Ice-water  to,  Tantalus,  Miss  Heth.  And  seats  are  about  as 
probable." 

"  Look!" 

She  nodded  dramatically  toward  the  hall  and  her  sudden  dis 
covery:  Mr.  Beirne's  private  lair,  presumably;  a  pleasant  little 
retreat  on  the  other  side  of  the  house,  luring  the  eye  through 
a  half -open  door.  A  little  to  the  back,  and  off  the  beaten  track, 
this  nook  seemed  to  have  escaped  the  irruption  of  guests  al 
together. 

"My  lodge,  as  I  live!"  said  Canning,  with  interest.  "And,  for 
once,  I  really  don't  believe  we'll  find  a  spoony  couple  sitting 

124 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


in  the  best  place.  Let's  advance  casually,  yet  with  lightning 
speed " 

They  passed  out  of  the  drawing-room  into  the  hall,  the  hum  of 
various  gaiety  in  their  ears.  No  voices  reached  them  from  the 
rest-haven  ahead.  Carlisle  was  suddenly  silent.  A  subtle  and 
thrilling  sense  of  expectancy  possessed  her,  making  talk  some 
what  difficult.  .  .  . 

However,  on  the  very  threshold  of  privacy,  her  agreeable 
feelings  met  with  a  cool  douche.  A  brazen  couple  was  already 
there,  sitting  in  the  best  place.  In  this  world  of  trouble  there 
always,  always  was.  The  fact  was  disappointing  enough,  to 
say  the  least  of  it,  but  what  made  matters  worse  was  that  it 
was  impossible  merely  to  exclaim  reprovingly,  as  one  usually 
does,  " Oh,  there 's  somebody  here!"  and  step  back  at  once.  Car 
lisle  saw  in  the  first  glance  that  the  girl  in  the  best  place  was 
no  other  than  her  special  friend  Mattie  Allen,  already  looking 
around  over  her  shoulder,  spying  her.  To  withdraw  from  Mattie, 
under  these  circumstances,  was  simply  not  to  be  thought  of. 

She  gave  Canning  a  quick,  backward,  upward  look  which  said, 
plainer  than  print,  "How  long,  O  Lord,  how  long?"  Recompos- 
ing  her  features  hastily,  she  stepped  on  in. 

"  Oh,  Mats  !  It 's  you  at  last !  We  Ve  been  looking  everywhere 
for  you.  Mr.  Canning  was  so  anxious  to  meet  you.  .  .  ." 

She  ended  dead.  The  intruding  "  couple "  had  risen  together, 
turning;  and  Carlisle  saw,  with  the  suddenest  and  oddest  little 
sinking  sensation,  that  the  male  half  of  it,  Mattie's  astound 
ing  capture,  was  the  lame  physician  from  the  slums,  he  whose 
face  and  words  had  become  inextricably  a  part  of  the  most  dis 
turbing  memories  of  her  life. 

She,  in  her  radiance,  had  met  the  slum  doctor's  eye  with  a  shock 
of  recognition;  she  looked  at  once  away.  She  felt  like  one  who 
has  walked  singing  into  a  malicious  trap.  Why,  oh,  why,  need 
the  man  have  been  ambushed  here,  of  all  places  under  the  sun, 
obtruding  his  undesired  presence  and  marplot  countenance  once 
again  on  her  and  Mr.  Canning?  .  .  . 

However,  if  there  was  no  withdrawing,  neither  was  there  the 
slightest  break  in  the  smooth  outer  continuity  of  things.  Dear 

125 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Mattie  (already  with  a  sheep's  eye  for  the  king  among  men  in  the 
doorway)  had  seized  the  conversation  even  before  Carlisle  left  it 
hanging. 

"  Hello,  darling  Cally !  Do  come  in  and  share  our  lovely  little 
snuggery.  Is  n  't  it  cunning?  —  don't  you  think  we  were  aw 
fully  smart  to  find  it?  Oh,  do  you  know  Dr.  Vivian  ?  —  Miss 
Heth." 

"How  do  you  do?"  said  Cally,  without  a  second  glance.  .  .  . 
"  This  is  she,  Mr.  Canning  —  Miss  Mattie  Allen,  whom  you  Ve 
heard  so  much  about  ..." 

Canning,  hardly  less  piqued  than  Carlisle  by  the  presence  of 
strangers  in  his  lodge,  and  unable  to  remember  having  heard  the 
name  Allen  before  in  his  life,  of  course  rose  gallantly. 

"I  hope  Miss  Allen  won't  think  me  impertinent,"  he  said,  most 
delightfully,  "if  I  claim  her  as  an  old  friend.  .  .  .  " 

Miss  Allen's  response  acquitted  him  of  all  impertinence. 
It  was  she  who  then  recalled  an  omission,  and  in  her  sweet  artless 
way  bade  the  two  gentlemen  be  acquainted.  Dr.  Vivian  (who 
could  not  exactly  recollect  the  steps  by  which  he  had  come  to  be 
duetting  in  his  uncle's  den  with  Miss  Allen)  looked  as  if  he  ex 
pected  to  shake  hands  with  Miss  Heth's  handsome  squire;  but 
Canning,  having  shot  him  with  a  quick  curious  glance,  merely 
bowed,  in  silence.  Through  the  minds  of  both  men  (and  also  of 
Miss  Carlisle  Heth)  had  swept  at  the  same  moment  a  darting 
memory  of  their  last  meeting.  .  .  . 

And  then  it  was  suddenly  seen  by  all  that  Mr.  Canning  had 
been  gathered  in  by  his  adroit  old  friend  Miss  Allen,  and  smartly 
withdrawn  from  the  general  society.  And  Cally  was  left  to  face 
alone  the  last  man  upon  earth  she  wanted  to  see. 

She,  whose  own  plans  had  been  so  utterly  different,  had  been 
on  her  guard  against  such  a  contingency  as  this;  but  Mattie's 
born  gift  for  strategics  had  simply  been  too  much  for  her.  Mr. 
Canning  had  been  surrounded  and  backed  against  a  book-case,  as 
it  were,  before  anybody  realized  what  was  happening  to  him.  .  .  . 

"But  oh,  you're  so  dreadfully  tall,"  she  heard  the  voice  of  her 
gifted  girl-friend,  as  from  a  distance.  "I  don't  believe  you  can 
look  far  enough  down  to  see  poor  little  Me.  ..." 

126 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


All  had  happened  at  speed:  the  lines  of  division  were  still  just 
forming.  And  Carlisle,  of  course,  had  no  idea  of  tamely  accept 
ing  such  an  unfair  distribution  of  things.  As  to  this  man,  Dr. 
Vivian,  her  attitude  toward  him  now,  after  the  Cooneys',  was 
simply  one  of  cool  polished  politeness.  She  had  told  him  what 
she  thought  of  him  about  the  Works,  and  he  had  humbly  apolo 
gized  for  the  wrong  he  had  done  her  at  the  Beach:  that  disposed 
of  him  forever,  and  altogether  to  her  advantage.  Cool  polished 
politeness;  but  she  did  not  intend  to  talk  with  him  any  more,  of 
course,  admitting  him  as  a  social  acquaintance;  and  she  was,  in 
fact,  just  moving  after  Mattie  and  Mr.  Canning,  really  opening 
her  mouth  to  join  in  their  pleasant  chat,  when  — 

"I  wonder,  do  you  know  if  there  are  any  marrons  glaces  to 
night,  Miss  Heth,"  said  the  voice  she  had  first  heard  in  the  sum 
mer-house  —  "with  the  little  white  jackets  on  them?  " 

The  girl  felt  a  number  of  things.  From  every  point  of  view 
this  inquiry,  so  queer  yet  so  clearly  social,  so  almost  glaringly 
inoffensive,  came  as  a  surprise  and  an  annoyance.  He  had 
merely  asked  that  on  purpose  to  detain  her.  Continuing  to  look 
at  her  two  friends,  so  near  and  yet  such  worlds  away,  she  said, 
coldly: 

"I  really  do  not  know.  I  Ve  not  been  in  the  dining-room." 

"Then  I  may  still  hope,"  he  answered,  with  the  same  air  of 
friendliness,  eager  in  its  way.  And,  continuing  his  out-of-place 
remarks,  he  said:  "I  promised  to  bring  some  from  the  party  to  a 
little  girl  that  —  that  I  —  well,  I  board  with  her  mother,  in  fact. 
She  seemed  to  have  set  her  heart  on  marrons,  though  how  she 
knew  that  such  things  existed  passes  imagination." 

"I  hope  you'll  find  them,  I'm  sure." 

"Oh,  thank  you,"  said  the  Severe  Arraigner,  quite  gratefully, 
it  seemed.  .  .  . 

Through  the  open  door  of  the  pleasant  little  room,  there 
floated  in  the  continual  murmur  of  voices  and  the  sighing  refrain 
of  the  waltz.  As  from  a  great  distance,  Carlisle  noted  that  Mr. 
Canning  found  Mattie  agreeably  amusing.  (What  on  earth  did 
the  men  see  in  her,  with  her  baby  airs  and  great  pop-eyes?)  But 
she  was  not  thinking  of  her  two  special  friends  now.  The  flat 

127 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

brusquerie  of  her  two  remarks  to  the  man  had  struck  her  own  ear 
unpleasantly:  they  were  neither  polished  nor  courteous.  Why 
was  she  so  silly  as  to  let  this  nobody,  who  had  nothing  whatever 
to  do  with  her,  so  annoy  and  distract  her  at  his  pleasure?  Above 
ail,  by  what  trick  of  his  look  had  he  made  her  feel,  the  moment  his 
eyes  fell  upon  her,  that  his  apology  had  not  settled  the  Beach 
episode,  exactly,  after  all?  .  .  . 

The  whole  situation  seemed  to  be  growing  intolerable;  and 
suddenly  it  came  over  her  that  polished  courtesy  was  not  the  note 
at  all.  Doubtless  the  trouble  was  that  she  could  not  forgive  his 
remark  in  the  summer-house,  after  all,  no  matter  how  generously 
she  tried.  What  was  needed  now  was  to  put  the  man  down  in 
such  a  way  that  he  would  take  care  not  to  come  near  her  again.  .  . . 

Dr.  Vivian,  who  seemed  to  hold  fast  to  his  one  topic,  was  add 
ing:  "I  don't  want  to  disappoint  her,  of  course,  particularly  as 
she 's  sick  to-night.  Just  a  little  touch  of  fever,  to  be  sure,  —  but 
she  has  n't  much  constitution,  I  fear.  ..." 

Miss  Heth  made  no  reply;  the  pause  threatened  to  become  a 
silence;  and  then  he  said  hastily,  as  if  to  save  the  conversation 
from  total  wreck: 

"By  the  way,  this  child  —  Corinne  Garland,  her  name  is  — 
is  an  operative  in  your  father's  factory,  Miss  Heth.  She's  been 
there  over  two  years." 

Cally's  head  turned.  For  the  first  time  she  looked  fully  at  the 
Cooneys'  poorhouse  idol.  And  now  she  remembered  that  she 
had  an  annihilative  weapon  against  him.  .  .  .  Had  he  led  up  to 
this  subject  on  purpose? 

"Oh!  .  .  .  She  works  at  my  father's  factory?" 

The  young  man's  look  was  plainly  not  controversial;  no,  it  was 
as  if  he  were  pleased  that  at  last  they  had  tapped  a  vein  of  com 
mon  interest.  In  one  glance  Carlisle's  trained  eye,  going  over 
him,  took  in  his  sartorial  eccentricities :  in  particular  the  "  shined  " 
shoes,  the  large  brass  shirt-studs,  and  the  "full-dress-suit" 
(exactly  that)  so  obviously  made  for  a  much  stouter  person.  She 
saw  that  the  man  looked  absurdly  out  of  place  here,  at  his  own 
uncle's.  Against  this  background  of  gaiety  and  glitter,  of  music, 
powder  and  decollete  gowns,  he  really  looked  quite  like  a  stray 

128 


V.    V.  Js     Eyes 

from  some  other  world:  only  the  more  so  in  that  he  himself 
appeared  quite  unconscious  of  any  alienship. 

Well,  then,  let  him  keep  to  his  own  world.  That,  in  fact,  was 
precisely  what  she  desired  of  him.  .  .  . 

"Yes,  a  buncher  there,  as  they're  called,"  he  was  quaintly 
explaining  —  "quite  the  best  one  in  the  shop,  I'm  told,  though 
she 's  only  eighteen  years  old.  She  has  a  record  of  6,500  cheroots 
in  one  day  — ' 

"But  she  has  been  taken  sick  at  it,  you  say?" 

"Undoubtedly  she  has  a  temperature  to-night,"  said  he,  in  an 
intent  sort  of  way,  desirous  of  giving  his  information  accurately. 
"I  did  n't  stop  to  take  it,  as  perhaps  I  should  have  done  — " 

"And  she  caught  her  fever  at  the  Works,  you  think?" 

"Oh!  ...  Well,  of  course  I  should  n't  say  that.  You  know  —  " 

"But  of  course  the  Works  are  full  of  terrible  diseases,  and 
everybody  who  works  there  quickly  catches  something  and 
dies?" 

Then  the  unmistakable  hostility  of  her  tone  caught  his  en 
grossed  ear.  Carlisle  saw  his  expression  change  a  little;  only  it 
did  not  change  nearly  so  much  as  she  meant  it  to.  He  gave  an 
embarrassed  little  laugh.  .  .  . 

"But  oh,  please"  said  the  voice  of  Mats,  near  by,  "  do  go  back 
and  tell  me  what  terminology  means.  You  don't  know  how  ter 
ribly  stupid  I  am.  .  .  . " 

"Of  course,  it  is  n't  nearly  so  bad  as  that,"  said  he.  "Factory 
work  is  hard  at  best,  you  know.  And  conditions  in  it  are  never 
very  good,  rarely  even  so  good  as  they  might  be,  as  it  seems  to  me. 
But  this  little  friend  of  mine  that  I  —  I  mentioned,  she's — " 

"  Why  did  you  mention  her  to  me  at  all?  " 

The  tall  young  man  in  the  fat-man's  dress-suit  gazed  down. 
He  pushed  back  his  crisp  hair.  .  .  . 

It  was  true  that  one  from  the  outskirts  could  rise  now  and  gird 
up  his  loins:  the  scribes  actually  called  before  the  flap  of  his  tent. 
True,  in  the  most  technical  sense,  that  is.  ...  And  yet  —  was 
the  passing  social  moment  a  proper  occasion  to  shout  and  preach 
at  the  unlessoned  upon  the  grim  subject  of  their  moral  opportuni 
ties  in  this  so  complex  world?  Where  was  even  the  solitude  be 

129 


V.    V.'s      Eyes 

hind  the  rubber  plants  which  Kern  had  (practically)  guaranteed? 
Was  it  kind,  was  it  even  well-mannered,  to  spoil  a  young  girl's 
pleasure  at  an  evening  party  with  bitter  talk  of  fire-escapes  and 
overstrained  floors?  John  the  Baptist,  God  knows,  should  have 
been  a  gentleman  .  .  . 

But  if  any  thoughts  like  this  played  through  the  alien's 
mind,  he  certainly  wore  no  air  of  perplexity  or  hesitancy.  He 
answered  without  pause,  in  quite  a  gentle  way: 

"  Well,  it  just  seemed  to  come  in  naturally  somehow.  We  just 
seemed  to  drift  into  it.  ... " 

But  it  was  no  time  for  gentleness  now.  Carlisle  Heth  was 
whipping  up  her  anger  to  destroy  him.  And  all  the  time,  a  part 
of  her  (the  largest  part,  it  seemed)  knew  quite  well  that  she  was 
whipping  it  up:  wondered  why  it  did  n't  surge  more  spontan 
eously,  as  she  had  such  a  perfect  right  to  expect.  .  .  . 

"  But  conditions  are  homicidal  in  my  father's  factory,  are  they 
not?" 

"Oh,"  said  the  man.  .  .  .  "Well,  as  to  that  —  of  course  opin 
ions  would  differ  somewhat  as  to  what  consti  — " 

"You  seem  to  —  to  have  more  courage  in  your  opinions  when 
you're  writing  letters,"  she  flung  at  him,  bright  cheeked.  .  .  . 
"Are  they  homicidal?" 

V.  Vivian's  eyes  had  fallen  before  her  indignant  gaze."  It  was 
only  too  clear  by  now  that  she  had  n't  forgiven  him  —  what 
wonder?  —  and  probably  never  would.  .  .  .  Still,  when  he  raised 
his  eyes  again,  the  girl  saw  in  them  a  look  quite  different  from 
what  she  had  meant  to  arouse  there.  The  man  was  feeling  sorry 
for  her  again.  .  .  . 

"  Miss  Heth,  I  consider  them  homicidal.  I  'm  sorrier  than  I  can 
say  to  —  to  worry  you  with  all  this  now.  Some  day  if  you  could 
give  me — " 

"You  mustn't  say  these  things  to  me,"  said  Carlisle,  feel 
ing  her  anger  to  be  real  enough  now.  "I  won't  permit  them. 
And—" 

"You  don't  imagine  that  I  say  them  for  pleasure,"  the  tall 
doctor  interrupted  hurriedly.  "I'm  compelled  to  speak  the 
truth,  however  disagreeable — " 

130 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Indeed?  I've  not  noticed  that  you  feel  bound  by  any  neces 
sity  that  way." 

To  that  he  made  no  reply  at  all.  But  she  saw,  by  the  look  he 
wore,  that  he  was  doing  his  best  to  convict  her  once  again  of 
having  said  something  unfair  and  rather  cheap  and  horrid.  .  .  . 

Turning  from  him,  she  delivered  the  coup  de  grace,  in  a  voice 
not  quite  so  firm  as  she  would  have  wished: 

"  I  don't  wish  to  talk  to  you  any  more.  You  must  not  speak  to 
me  again.  ..." 

And  she  added  at  once,  to  a  more  congenial  audience:  "Oh!" 

"Oh,  oh!  Cally!"  whispered  Mattie  Allen,  turning  simultane 
ously,  and  for  the  first  time,  from  Mr.  Canning. 

And  Mr.  Canning  said:  "Ah!  —  what's  happened?  .  .  ." 

In  almost  the  same  moment  all  three  had  become  aware  that 
the  rattle  of  talk  and  laughter  outside  the  little  room  had  entirely 
died  away.  There  had  fallen  upon  the  house  of  gaiety  a  strange 
silence,  in  which  a  pin-fall  might  almost  have  been  heard,  and  the 
slow  speaking  of  a  single  voice,  the  length  of  the  house  away,  was 
heard  most  distinctly. 

To  neither  of  the  two  girls  was  this  proceeding  a  mystery. 
They  were  familiar  with  the  New  Year's  Eve  rites,  and  Mattie, 
after  a  number  of  pretty  Sh-h-h  gestures,  whispered  the  explana 
tion  to  Mr.  Canning: 

"They  're  reading  out  the  Old  Year.  We  must  all  go  see  it. 
It's  so  cunning  and  quaint.  ..." 

So  conversation  of  all  sorts  was  summarily  suspended.  Even 
whispers  sounded  loud  in  the  sudden  hush.  The  four  young 
people  moved  toward  the  door.  For  a  moment  they  had  almost 
the  air  of  a  company  of  friends.  Young  Dr.  Vivian,  who  was 
nobody's  friend,  stood  back  for  Miss  Heth  to  pass  out;  but, 
seeing  that  she  lingered  beside  her  gallant,  he  turned  again 
silently  after  Miss  Allen,  who  beckoned  to  him  sh-h-ing\y,  whose 
property  he  seemed  mysteriously  to  have  become.  .  .  . 

The  alien  passed  out  of  sight,  limping.  If  his  only  party  that 
year  had  gone  rather  badly  with  him,  it  was  not  less  so  with 
another.  ^Behind  him  in  the  firelit  den,  Carlisle  looked  up  at 
Canning/color  coming  back  into  her  cheek,  her  breast  rising  and 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

falling.  The  sight  of  him,  all  to  herself  again,  was  more  than  balm 
to  a  wound,  more  than  harbors  to  storm-swept  mariners. 

"Is  there  any  rest  for  the  weary!"  she  whispered.  "Oh,  me! 
Let's  go  home,  right  after  this!" 

Canning,  who  also  wore  a  faint  air  of  persecution  for  right 
eousness'  sake,  took  her  gloved  hand,  and  she  did  not  with 
draw  it. 

"Do  you  know,"  he  answered,  with  a  little  smile,  "that's  the 
cleverest  thing  I've  heard  said  to-night.  ..." 

"We  can  have  a  little  party  all  to  ourselves,"  said  Carlisle, 
rather  tremulously.  "It's  been  so  horrid  to-night.  ..." 

They  opened  the  back  door  to  let  the  Old  Year  out.  They 
flung  wide  the  front  doors  to  let  the  New  Year  in.  They  lowered 
all  lights  to  the  dimness  of  obsequies.  The  gay  company,  stand 
ing,  ranged  the  long  room  in  a  ghostly  half-light,  and  old  Mr. 
Beirne,  from  his  immemorial  post  between  the  tall  windows,  read 
from  a  great  book  "The  Dying  Year,"  in  a  voice  as  slow  and  sol 
emn  as  he  could  make  it.  The  stately  lines  brought  home  with  a 
certain  force,  rather  emphasized  by  the  festive  contrast,  the  cer 
tain  passing  of  all  mundane  things.  Here  was  another  milestone 
left  behind,  and  you  and  I  would  pass  this  way  no  more.  Over 
the  long  loose  dim  ring,  your  eye  fell  upon  a  familiar  and 
friendly  face,  fallen  suddenly  a  little  sad;  and  memory  stirred  of 
the  many  times  you  had  looked  at  that  face,  and  with  it  wonder 
of  what  another  year  might  bring  to  you  two.  Would  you  stand 
here  like  this,  friends  good  and  true,  with  hearts  tuned  to  the 
same  feeling,  a  twelvemonth  from  to-night?  There  was  felt  a 
quick,  childlike  impulse  for  hands  all  round  and  such  a  singing  of 
"  Auld  Lang  Syne"  as  would  have  brought  the  police  on  the  run. 

By  long  practice  and  the  most  accurate  chronometric  reckon 
ing,  old  Mr.  Beirne  timed  his  proceedings  to  a  decimal.  The  last 
line  of  the  slow-read  poem  died  in  a  deafening  uproar  without. 
Every  bell  in  the  city,  it  seemed,  every  whistle  and  chime,  every 
firecracker  and  penny-trumpet  and  cannon  (there  was  but  one), 
to  say  nothing  of  many  an  inebriated  human  voice,  hailed  in  a 
roaring  diapason  the  birth  of  a- new  year.  At  Mr.  Beirne's  the 

132 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


outer  tumult  was  echoed  in  the  manner  of  the  well-bred.  The 
doors  were  shut,  with  the  infant  inside;  the  lights  flew  up;  glasses 
clinked,  merry  healths  were  pledged,  new  fealties  sworn  by  look 
alone.  Gaiety  overcame  silence.  All  talked  with  one  voice. 

Carlisle  Heth  descended  the  stairs  in  a  carriage-robe  of  blue- 
and-fur,  giving  and  taking  lively  good-nights.  Canning,  already 
muffleredand  overcoated,  stood  awaiting  her  near  the  door:  over 
many  heads  she  caught  sight  of  his  splendid  figure  and  her  heart 
leapt  a  little.  If  it  had  been  horrid  for  her  to-night  so  far,  no 
one  would  have  guessed  it,  looking  at  her.  Her  shining  loveli 
ness  upon  the  stairs  attracted  considerable  attention;  even  her 
best  girl-friend  Mattie  Allen  noticed  it,  spoke  of  it  to  Evey 
McVey.  .  ^ 

And  then  at  the  foot  of  the  steps,  she  ran  right  into  Jack  Dal- 
housie's  friend  once  more,  the  lame  stranger  whom  she  had  just 
finally  disposed  of. 

Encountering  the  man's  eyes  by  mischance,  she  would  of  course 
have  looked  away  at  once,  but  her  glance  was  trapped  by  the 
expression  on  his  face.  He  was  smiling;  smiling  straight  at  her. 
An  odd  smile  it  was,  and  complicated;  not  without  diffidence, 
but  certainly  not  without  hope;  quite  an  eager  smile,  confid 
ing  somehow,  by  the  gift  he  had.  It  was  as  if  he  was  saying  that 
of  course  he  knew  she  had  n't  really  meant  what  she  said  back 
there;  and  that  he,  for  one,  would  never  let  a  hasty  word  or 
two  cut  him  off  from  the  hope  of  being  good  friends  yet. 

Having  thus  by  a  trick  captured  her  attention,  he  made  a 
pleased  sort  of  gesture  toward  the  breast-pocket  of  his  fat-man's 
coat,  and,  while  she  passed  silent  within  a  foot  of  him,  said  quite 
eagerly: 

"/ — I  got  the  marrons!" 


XI 

In  which  Mr.  Canning  must  go  South  for  his  Health,  and  Catty 
lies  awake  to  think. 

MIDNIGHT  stillness  hung  over  the  House  of  Heth,  five 
doors  from  Mr.  Beirne's.  Dim  sounds  from  above  indi 
cated  that  Mrs.  Heth,  who  had  come  in  a  few  moments 
earlier,  did  not  mean  to  sit  up  for  anybody.  She  had,  however, 
left  the  door  "on  the  latch"  as  agreed.  Carlisle  and  Mr.  Can 
ning  passed  within,  out  of  the  biting  New  Year. 

It  was  like  stepping  into  heaven  to  be  at  home  again,  after  the 
rabble  and  rattle  at  Mr.  Beirne's.  Canning  shut  the  door  with 
something  like  a  sigh. 

"  A  lodge  at  last !  We  've  had  —  well,  a  fragmentary  time  of  it, 
have  n't  we?  .  .  .  That  chap  with  the  game  foot  is  simply  my 
hoodoo." 

Carlisle  winced  a  little.   "  Oh !  Then  you  did  remember  him?  " 

"  Could  I  forget  my  Beach  supplanter,  my  giver  of  colds  in  the 
head?  What's  wrong  with  the  fellow  anyway?" 

"  Everything,"  said  she.   " Let 's  go  into  the  library." 

''Why  should  he  remind  me  of  a  camp-meeting  funeral,  I 
wonder?"  mused  Canning,  following  behind  —  "or  is  it  some 
thing  I  read  in  the  book  of  Job?  " 

The  girl  answered  with  a  vague  laugh.  Mr.  Canning's  odd  but 
evident  antagonism  to  the  man  she  herself  had  such  cause  to 
dislike  was  agreeable  to  her,  but  the  topic  was  not.  She  had 
had  enough  of  the  Vivians  of  this  world  for  one  night.  She  led 
the  way  through  the  dark  drawing-room,  and  at  the  switch  be 
yond  the  door  turned  the  light  into  two  soft-tinted  dome-lamps. 
The  library  was  massive  rather  than  "livable";  it  had  books, 
which  is  more  than  can  be  said  for  some  libraries;  but  they  were 
chiefly  books  in  stately  sets,  yards  and  yards  of  them  just  alike: 
a  depressing  matter  to  the  true  lover.  However,  it  was  at  least 

134 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


solitude;  solitude  enveloped  with  an  air  of  intimacy  vastly  agree 
able  and  compensatory.  It  did  not  seem  so  certain  now  that  the 
golden  evening  was  ruined  past  hope.  .  .  . 

"You  and  he  seemed  to  be  having  a  terribly  earnest  discus 
sion,"  said  Canning.  "Of  course  I  did  my  best  to  eavesdrop, 
but  Miss  Allen  was  so  charming  I  caught  only  a  word  now  and 
then." 

"He  was  lecturing  me  about  how  my  father  ought  to  run  his 
business.  He  always  does.  ..." 

She  replenished  the  dying  fire  with  a  soft  lump,  and  poked  it 
unskilfully,  all  but  stabbing  the  life  out  of  it.  Canning,  stand 
ing  and  staring  half-absently  into  the  soft  glow,  did  not  offer  to 
relieve  her  of  the  poker.  They  knew  each  other  very  well  by 
now. 

"Only  don't  let's  spoil  our  little  party  by  talking  aboi  t  him," 
she  went  on  —  "  he  rubs  me  the  wrong  way  so.  And  do  please 
take  off  that  polar  overcoat.  It  positively  makes  me  shiver.  ..." 

"Lecturing  appears  to  be  the  fellow's  specialty.  .  .  .  Well!" 

He  threw  his  overcoat,  stick,  and  white  gloves  on  the  fire- 
settle,  turned  and  glanced  down  at  her.  After  the  long  and 
broken  evening,  he  looked  somewhat  fatigued.  Carlisle,  already 
seated,  was  just  beginning  to  unbutton  her  left  long  glove. 

"  Fine  hours,  fine  hours  these,  for  even  a  play  sick-man !  Yet 
I  linger  on.  ..." 

"You  must  stay,"  said  she,  "till  the  last  person  has  gone  from 
Mr.  Beirne's." 

The  mantel  clock  stood  at  twenty  minutes  past  twelve.  With 
a  little  laugh  she  reached  up  and  turned  its  small  commemora 
tive  face  to  the  wall. 

"Or,"  she  added,  becoming  grave,  "are  you  really  quite  tired 
out  with  being  with  me?" 

"I  was  hardly  thinking  that,"  said  Canning. 

He  dropped  into  a  chair  and  stared  into  the  fire.  Carlisle 
glanced  at  his  face  in  profile;  a  virile  and  commanding  face  it  was, 
and  to  her,  singularly  attractive. 

"My  thoughts  were  running  in  the  contrary  direction,"  said 
Canning.  "Do  you  remember  my  saying  long  ago  that  once  I 

135 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


began  to  gambol,  I  was  never  satisfied  till  I  had  gambolled  all 
over  the  place?  I  suppose  I  need  a  guardian,  but  unluckily  I 
have  one.  Miss  Heth,  I  've  some  sad  news  —  sad  for  me,  I  mean. 
I  must  go  south  to-morrow." 

Carlisle  turned  her  head  with  a  little  start. 

"To-morrow!  Oh,  not" 

"No  —  you're  right!  I  can't  go  to-morrow  !  The  day  after  at 
the  farthest,  or  I  suppose  Heber'll  be  down  after  me  with  a 
couple  of  sheriffs." 

"  But  I  don't  understand,"  she  said,  hurriedly.  "  What 's  hap 
pened?  I  —  I  hoped  you  would  stay  till  the  end  of  the  week  at 
least." 

Canning's  gaze  remained  upon  the  fire. 

"So  did  I,  though  of  course  I  Ve  known  I'd  no  business  hang 
ing  on  the  skirt  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line  this  way.  I  might 
almost  as  well  be  in  my  office  at  home  —  tackling  the  pile  of 
work  that's  been  rolling  up  while  I  go  on  with  this  invalid's  mum 
mery.  .  .  .  Well,  Heber  's  found  me  out,  as  of  course  the  clever 
beggar  would.  He's  been  thinking,  you  see,  that  I  was  in  Pine- 
hurst,  at  the  least.  I  had  a  red-headed  telegram  from  him  this 
afternoon  ordering  me  to  move  on  to  Palm  Beach  instanter,  or 
he  would  bring  my  revered  parents  'down  on  me  like  a  thou 
sand  of  brick  —  no  small  matter,  I  assure  you.  .  .  .  Palm 
Beach  —  Havana,  perhaps! —  till  winter  breaks!  ...  A  happy 
New  Year  message,  is  n't  it?" 

"It's  very  sad  for  me,"  said  Carlisle,  looking  away  from 
him. 

"Well,  I  can't  say  that  I  feel  exactly  hilarious  about  it,  you 
know." 

There  fell  a  brief  silence,  in  which  the  crackling  of  the  large 
new  coal  became  noticeable. 

"Duty  is  a  hard  word,  Miss  Heth,"  said  Canning.  "A  thou 
sand  times  I  've  wished  that  I  was  n't  an  only  son  —  my  family 's 
one  hopeful.  But  I  am,  alas.  .  .  .  And  hence  the  little  rest- 
cure.  ..." 

"Yes,  it 'shard,"  she  answered.  And  instead  of  going  on  as 
some  girls  would,  "Don't  you  think  you  could  possibly  stay  a 

136 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

little  longer?"  —  she  added,  in  tones  of  comforting:  "But  of 
course  you  will  enjoy  Florida  immensely.  You  know  you'll  find 
agreeable  people,  and  plenty  of  fun  — " 

"Of  course!  It  is  my  particular  delight/'  said  Canning,  in  his 
hoarsened  voice,  "to  stay  in  an  attractive  place  just  long  enough 
to  fall  in  love  with  it,  and  then  be  whipped  away  like  a  naughty 
schoolboy." 

Carlisle  slowly  drew  off  her  glove. 

"I'm  glad  you've  liked  it  here,"  said  she "Shall  you 

stop  again,  on  your  way  back  home?  " 

The  man's  eyes  turned  from  the  fire  full  upon  her  face.  His 
voice  changed  a  little. 

"What  do  you  think?" 

"I  only  know  what  I  hope,"  said  she;  and  her  gold-and-black 
lashes  fell. 

The  firelight  played  upon  her  half-averted  face,  twisted 
shadows  into  the  sheen  of  her  hair,  incarnadined  her  smooth 
cheek.  Whiter  and  softer  than  swan's  down  gleamed  her  round 
bare  shoulder,  her  perfect  neck.  Canning's  blood  moved.  He 
turned  more  fully  and  leaned  toward  her,  his  elbow  on  her 
chair-arm. 

"Could  you  think  that  all  these  happy  days  with  you  have 
meant  so  little  to  me?  ...  You've  a  poor  opinion  of  me,  in 
deed.  Did  n't  I  say  in  the  beginning  that  you  did  not  know 
how  to  be  kind?" 

At  his  tone,  the  girl's  breath  came  faster.  She  sat  in  silence 
pulling  her  long  gloves  between  slim  little  hands. 

"You  are  hard,  Miss  Heth,"  said  Canning,  slowly.  And  he 
added,  with  that  touch  of  unconscious  pride  with  which  he  always 
spoke  of  the  Cannings,  their  position  and  serious  responsibili 
ties  in  the  world:  "When  I  compel  myself  to  think  of  my  duty 
toward  my  father  and  my  family,  I  make  sacrifices  which 
ought,  I  think,  to  win  me  your  approval.  I  've  a  place  to  fill 
some  day.  .  .  .  But  since  you  ask,  I  shall  think  also  of  myself. 
I  shall  come  again  to  the  old  Pa3>ne  fort." 

She  gave  him  a  look  which  said  that  she  was  not  really  unkind. 
And  Canning  immediately  possessed  her  ungloved  hand  in  both  of 

137 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

his.  Her  heart  fluttered  at  his  touch;  her  hand  seemed  to  feel 
that  this  indeed  was  where  it  belonged;  but,  on  the  whole,  training 
and  intuition  appeared  to  indicate  a  contrary  view.  There  was  a 
moment  of  stillness,  of  acquiescence,  in  which  she  became  aware 
that  he  bent  nearer.  And  then  Carlisle  rose,  with  a  natural  air, 
taking  the  hand  along  with  her,  incidentally  as  it  were.  Stand 
ing  by  the  fire,  looking  down  into  it,  she  said: 

"The  town  will  be  empty  without  you." 

Behind  her,  Canning  had  risen  too,  with  a  sort  of  sharpness. 
He  was  silent.  And  then  it  was  borne  in  upon  her  that  the  proud 
young  man  was  moving  toward  his  trappings,  to  go.  .  .  . 

"Your  friendly  words  are  much  appreciated,"  said  he,  smiling. 
"But  I  observe  that  I've  overstayed  horribly." 

The  girl  regarded  him.  Hardly  since  the  first  moments  in  Kerr's 
apartment,  had  she  heard  that  ironical  note  in  Mr.  Canning's 
voice;  and  yet  she  understood  at  once,  and  was  not  alarmed. 
Gently  as  she  had  removed  herself,  he  had  felt  himself  rebuffed; 
and  he  could  be  abrupt  at  his  pleasure. 

Nothing  good  could  come  out  of  this  horrid  evening,  but  there 
would  be  another.  And  in  her  heart,  besides,  she  did  not  be 
lieve  that  he  would  go  away  day  after  to-morrow.  .  .  . 

"Perhaps  you'll  drive  with  me  to-morrow  afternoon?" 

"Oh,  I'd  like  to  so  much,"  she  said,  naturally,  as  if  nothing 
had  passed  between  them.  "And  I'm  so  sorry  about  to-night, 
really.  You  've  been  such  a  saint,  and  all  for  me.  You  deserve 
a  beautiful  reward,  a  big  medal,  at  least,  and  instead,  an  icy 
five-mile  ride  — " 

"Reward!"  said  Canning,  wheeling,  still  smiling  a  little. 
"What  under  heaven  does  the  inconsequent  sex  know  of  reward? 
Up  they  trip,  and  with  one  flip  of  a  little  high  heel  kick  a  man's 
settled  plans  topsy-turvy.  And  for  this  upsetting  he  must 
thank  his  stars  if  he  gets  in  return  one  kind  smile  a  week.  Pun 
ishment,  not  reward,  strikes  me  as  the  feminine  idea.  .  ..." 

"I  think,"  she  said,  a  little  embarrassed,  "  the  only  person  I  've 
really  punished  to-night  is  Me." 

And  she  felt  a  twinge,  half  regret,  half  compunction,  which  was 
not  tactical  at  all.  After  all,  this  man  had  been  extraordinarily 

138 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

nice  to  her,  and  she  was  letting  him  go  feeling  that  she  did  not 
appreciate  it.  ... 

She  offered  him  her  left  hand  to  say  good-night,  and  invested 
the  gesture  with  a  sweet  air  of  penitence. 

"But  don't  speak  as  if  you  were  displeased  with  me,  just  when 
I'm  so  sad  about  your  going  away.  .  .  .  Are  you  displeased  with 
me  —  or  do  you  like  me  very  much?" 

"I  am  displeased  with  you,  and  I  like  you  very  much." 

As  the  small  hand  lingered  with  him,  warming  by  contact, 
the  man's  clasp  tightened.  He  brought  up  his  other  hand  and 
folded  it  over  it. 

"I'll  miss  you  dreadfully — you  know  that.  .  .  .  Very,  very 
much?  That 's  the  largest  amount  of  liking  known,  is  n't  it?" 

"Then  that 's  the  amount  ..." 

Outside  sounded  the  blasts  of  horns  and  the  wheels  of  departing 
guests  from  Mr.  Beirne's: t  low  on  the  sand  and  loud  on  the  stone.' 
In  the  soft-lit  room  no  sound  broke  the  nocturnal  stillness  except 
the  mechanism  of  the  clock,  pushing  busily  toward  the  three- 
quarter  mark.  Carlisle  was  looking  up  at  Canning  with  eyes  full 
of  unpremeditated  sweetness.  Into  Canning's  face  the  blood 
leapt  suddenly.  Without  other  warning,  he  leaned  back  against 
the  heavy  table,  and  took  her  almost  roughly  in  his  arms. 

"I'm  mad  about  you,  you  lovely  little  witch.  Do  you  hear? 
It  grinds  my  heart  that  I  must  leave  you.  ..." 

The  turbulence  of  the  sudden  demonstration  swept  the  girl 
from  her  moorings.  If  she  had  seemed  to  invite  it,  it  yet  came 
quite  unexpectedly.  For  the  moment  she  stood  still  in  Canning's 
embrace,  yielding  herself  with  a  thrilled  passivity,  as  one  who, 
with  a  full  heart,  touches  high  destiny  at  last.  And  in  that  mo 
ment  her  cheek,  hair,  eyes,  then  at  last  her  lips,  felt  the  sting  of 
his  Catullian  endearments.  .  .  . 

But  the  moment  of  bliss  in  culmination  passed  with  fainting 
quickness.  The  willing  ear  heard  not.  Unsteadied  intuitions  be 
gan  to  work  again,  chilling  the  girl's  blood  with  the  knowledge 
of  wrong  here,  of  glaring  omission.  And  the  more  her  gallant 
murmured,  it  seemed,  the  wider  gaped  the  sudden  lack.  .  .  . 

"You 've  been  so  good  to  me  —  so  dear,  so  sweet  —  charmed 

139 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

away  my  hours  as  no  one  else  could.  Darling !  .  .  .  It 's  hard  to 
be  the  stranger  and  the  passer-by!  I  know  you  '11  forget  me,  only 
too  soon.  .  .  .  How  can  I  tell  you  how  grateful  I  am  for  all  you  Ve 
given  me,  in  sweetness  and  happy  days?  .  .  ." 

How,  indeed,  since  this  was  the  utmost  of  his  wish  of  her? 

The  girl's  blood  warmed  again  with  a  leap,  overflowing  upon  her 
fine  skin.  Understanding  now  came  to  her,  with  crushing  force. 
Her  knight  made  for  her  a  pretty  summary  of  an  episode  that 
was  past.  There  was  to  come  no  coronation  of  words  to  en 
noble  these  caresses:  Mr.  Canning,  at  parting,  desired  to  thank 
her  for  her  sweetness.  And  this  was  the  high  moment  toward 
which  she  had  been  dancing  on  the  fleece-pink  of  clouds  through 
many  days.  .  .  . 

And  then  his  arms  about  her  were  suddenly  a  burning  and  a 
torture;  she  felt  a  blush  sweep  her  from  head  to  foot,  enveloping 
her  as  in  a  garment  of  fire,  shaking  her  with  a  wild  mysterious 
shame.  And  she  took  herself,  almost  with  violence,  from  the 
enfolding  embrace. 

All  tenderness,  Canning  came  after  her,  Pan  and  his  fleeing 
nymph.  .  .  . 

"You  darling,  I  Ve  frightened  you!  Forgive  my  roughness. 
You  can't  know  how  your  utter  adorableness  throws  me  off  my 
guard.  ..." 

She  turned  to  the  mantelpiece,  and,  laying  a  rounded  arm 
upon  it,  buried  her  face  from  his  view. 

Canning  had  come  near,  intending  a  gentler  caress;  but  some 
thing  in  the  dead  unresponsiveness  of  her  bowed  figure  abruptly 
allayed  that  intention.  The  complete  repulse,  the  girl's  silent 
emotion,  had  surprised  him,  indeed,  like  a  box  on  the  ears.  Well 
he  knew  the  feministic*  curve  of  advance  and  recoil.  Yet  he 
found  himself  unexpectedly,  profoundly,  stirred. 

"I'm  a  brute,"  said  he,  presently,  with  an  odd  ring  of  convic 
tion.  "You  go  to  my  head  like  drink  sweeter  than  was  ever 
brewed.  I  Ve  had  a  hard  fight  all  these  days  to  keep  my  hands 
off  you " 

Carlisle  raised  her  head  and  turned.  Canning  had  expected 
to  see  her  face  stained  with  tears,  or,  more  probably,  flaming 

140 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


with  (at  least  half -feigned)  anger.  His  heart  turned  a  little  when 
he  saw  how  still  and  white  she  was. 

"You  must  go  now,  please,"  she  said,  in  rather  a  strained  voice, 
not  looking  towards  him;  and  by  some  strange  and  subtle  pro 
cess  of  association  she  fell  into  words  which  she  had  used  within 
the  hour  to  another:  "I  don't  wish  to  talk  with  you  any  more." 

The  man's  handsome  face  flushed  brightly.  He  said  in  a 
throbbing  voice: 

"  I  can't  let  you  dismiss  me  this  way.  I  can't  endure  it.  Have 
I  offended  so  —  " 

"I  can't  talk  with  you  any  more  now.    I  must  ask  — " 

"  But  you  won't  be  so  cruel !  If  I  've  offended,  won't  you  make 
some  allowance  for  my  temptation?  Am  I  a  snow-man,  to  come 
so  near  and  be  unmoved?  Am  I  to  be  a  monk,  because  I  live 
under  sentence  in  a  monastery?  You  ..." 

To  do  him  justice,  he  did  not  look  in  the  least  like  either  of 
these  things.  However,  Carlisle  missed  his  look.  Standing  with 
lowered  eyes,  she  said  again,  colorlessly: 

"Please  leave  me  now  —  I  beg  you  — " 

"But  I  can't  leave  you  this  way! "  said  Canning.  "It's  im 
possible!  You  misjudge  me  so  —  " 

"Then  I  must  leave  you,"  said  Carlisle;  and  started  to  go 
past  him. 

But  Canning  blocked  her  way,  his  face,  troubled  with  deep 
concern,  more  handsome  and  winning  than  she  had  ever  seen  it. 
Only  she  still  did  not  see  it.  He  thought,  with  a  whirling  mind, 
that  this  was  carrying  the  thing  rather  too  far;  but  he  saw  with 
chagrin  and  a  curious  inner  tumult  the  entire  uselessness  of  more 
argument  to-night. 

"I  am  heartbroken,"  he  said,  a  little  stiffly,  "that  I've 
brought  you  somehow  to  think  so  hardly  of  me.  Your  thought 
does  a  great  wrong  to  the  —  respect  and  deep  devotion  I  feel 
and  shall  feel  for  you."  He  wobbled  the  least  bit  over  these 
words,  as  if  himself  conscious  of  a  certain  inadequacy,  but  went 
on  with  his  usual  masculine  decisiveness:  "Now  it  must  of  course 
be  as  you  wish.  But  to-morrow  I  shall  make  you  understand  me 
better." 

141 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

He  picked  up  hat,  coat,  and  stick,  defeated,  yet  not  spoiled  of 
his  air.  But  as  he  turned  to  go,  and  looked  at  her  for  his  formal 
bow,  he  was  all  at  once  aware  that  she  wore  a  wholly  new  dig 
nity  in  his  sight,  a  subtly  enhanced  desirability.  Unexpectedly 
her  marble  loveliness  shot  him  through  and  through,  and  he  said 
in  a  low  throbbing  voice: 

"You  darling  —  darling!  How  can  I  bear  to  part  from  you 
like  this?  Forgive  me  now,  Carlisle  ..." 

But  Carlisle's  only  response  was  to  move  away  toward  the 
hall. 

A  moment  later  the  front  door  shut,  rather  hard.  Carlisle's 
second  impassioned  parting  within  an  hour  was  over.  She 
switched  off  the  tall  newel-post  lamp,  and  went  upstairs  in  the 
dark. 

She  was  a  long  time  in  going  to  sleep.  Not  since  she  had 
the  fever,  as  a  little  girl,  was  the  great  god  of  forgetfulness 
so  elusive  to  her  wooing.  Not  since  the  night  at  the  Beach, 
and  never  in  her  life  before  that  night,  had  the  merry  imps  of 
thought  so  strung  her  brain  upon  a  thumbscrew.  Now  came 
Self-Communion,  rarest  of  her  comrades,  and  perched  upon  her 
pillow. 

All  was  plain  now,  by  one  instant  of  merciless  illumination. 
She  sufficed  to  beguile  Mr.  Canning's  leisure  for  an  invalid  so 
journ  far  from  his  normal  haunts,  but  apart  from  that  she  had  no 
existence  for  him.  He  could  see  her  daily,  monopolize  her  time, 
for  these  things  happened  to  amuse  him ;  he  could  make  love  to 
her,  lead  her  in  a  hundred  subtle  ways  to  feel  that  her  compan 
ionship  was  sweet  to  him;  and  then  he  could  board  a  train  and 
ride  handsomely  away,  and  woe  is  the  word  to  the  conquered. 
And  by  this  freedom  that  he  felt,  and  in  particular  by  the  license 
of  his  prodigal  kisses,  it  appeared  that  she  read  the  heart  of  his 
secret  opinion  of  her. 

Never  again  should  he  show  her  this  opinion,  at  least:  he  should 
board  his  train  with  no  more  sight  of  her.  On  this  her  thought 
was  crystal-clear  from  the  beginning.  That  such  short  shrift  to 
Mr.  Hugo  Canning  was  suicidally  impolitic,  she  naturally  had  no 

142 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

difficulty  in  realizing;  the  dread  of  reporting  the  affair  to  mamma 
had  already  shot  through  her  mind.  But  for  the  moment  these 
things  seemed  oddly  not  to  matter.  She  was  clearly  in  the  grip 
of  one  of  those  mysterious  "flare-ups"  which  her  mother  disliked 
and  objected  to  so  intensely:  to  such  lengths  borne  by  her  recoil 
from  Mr.  Canning's  familiarity.  She  had  met  the  common  fate 
of  beauty.  Flaming  young  men  had  kissed  her  before  now.  But 
none  had  kissed  her  without  the  desire  of  her  love,  none  as  the 
fair  price  exacted  for  a  couple  of  weeks'  lordly  attentions.  By 
their  lightness,  as  by  their  passion,  Canning's  kisses  had  seemed 
to  sear  and  scar.  They  had  given  her  body  to  be  burned.  For 
this  was  the  fulness  of  his  desire  of  her,  her  favor  to  wear  in  his 
button-hole;  and  his  thought  stabbed  at  her,  beneath  his  gallant's 
air,  that  by  now  he  had  fairly  earned  it. 

In  the  dark  as  it  was,  the  memory  of  her  moment  of  revelation 
had  turned  the  girl's  face  downward  upon  her  pillow.  How,  oh 
how,  had  he  come  to  image  her  on  so  low  a  plane?  How  did  it 
come  to  be  that  men  should  have  slighting  opinions  of  her,  of 
all  people,  and  so  slap  them  across  her  face?  .  .  . 

It  was  the  first  time  that  such  a  thought  of  herself  had  ever 
risen  before  her  mind,  though  in  a  sense  not  the  first  time  she 
had  had  a  pretext  for  it.  Her  painful  meditations  included  brief 
note  of  Vivian,  the  eccentric  stray  across  her  path  who  had  once 
considered  her  deserving  of  pity  as  a  poor  little  thing.  He,  of 
course,  was  only  an  unbalanced  religious  fanatic,  whose  opinions 
were  not  of  the  slightest  consequence  to  anybody,  whom  every 
body  seemed  to  take  a  dislike  to  at  sight  (except  ignorant  pau 
pers  like  the  Cooneys),  and  whose  ideal  type  of  girl  would  prob 
ably  be  some  hideous  dowd,  a  slum-worker,  a  Salvation  Army 
lassie,  perhaps.  Yet  this  man  had  felt  sorry  for  her  at  the  Beach; 
he  had  done  it  again  to-night.  .  .  .  And  if  he  was  quite  out  of  her 
world  of  men,  was  of  course  not  a  man  at  all  as  she  counted  men, 
the  same  could  not  possibly  be  said  of  Mr.  Canning,  a  man  of 
her  own  kind  in  the  royal  power.  .  .  . 

The  thought  of  herself  as  vulnerable  and  vincible  to  the  hostile 
sex  had  come  upon  the  girl,  fire-new,  with  disruptive  force.  It  was 
pulling  out  the  pin  which  held  her  life  together.  For  if  she  was 

143 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


a  failure  in  the  subjugation  of  men,  then  she  was  a  failure  every 
where:  this  being  the  supreme,  indeed,  you  might  say  the  only, 
purpose  of  her  life.  .  .  . 

Below  in  the  still  house,  the  soft-toned  chimes  rang  two; 
and,  almost  on  the  heels  of  that,  it  seemed,  three.  Step  by  step, 
Carlisle  went  back  over  all  her  acquaintance  with  Canning  from 
their  first  meeting;  and  gave  herself  small  glory.  She  had  pursued 
him  to  the  Beach;  she  had  pursued  him  to  Willie's  apartment; 
and  on  both  occasions,  and  since,  she  had  used  her  arts  to  lure 
him  into  reversing  the  pursuit.  A  dozen  times  she  had  sought 
to  lead  him,  so  it  seemed  now,  further  than  he  ever  had  the  slight 
est  idea  of  going.  Was  it  really  a  wonder  that  he,  whose  experi 
enced  eyes  observed  everything,  had  seen  in  her  merely  his 
ready  plaything?  Repulsed,  he  could  wear  an  air  of  genuine  ten 
derness,  but  never  doubt  that  in  his  heart  he  was  laughing  at  her, 
and  had  a  right  to.  ... 

And  she  herself  .  .  .  Were  these  the  pangs  of  unrequited  love 
that  tore  her  breast?  In  her  desire  to  land  the  great  catch,  by 
hook  or  by  crook,  when  had  she  paused  to  consult  her  heart 
about  the  glittering  prospect?  What  else  did  it  all  mean  but  that 
she,  calculating,  had  offered  herself  to  him  at  the  price  of  his 
hand,  name,  and  enduring  complement  of  happiness,  and  he, 
lightly  responding,  had  rated  her  as  worth,  at  most,  only  his 
counterfeit  coin.  Why  else  should  the  memory  of  the  moment 
downstairs  continually  return  to  her  like  an  affront? 

She  was  of  her  world  and  time,  not  unsophisticated;  but  it 
chanced  that  she  possessed  a  mind  natively  maiden.  Through  all 
her  vigil,  through  all  her  questioning  and  novel  self-criticism,  her 
mind's-eye  picture  of  Canning,  as  his  arms  went  round  her,  ran 
like  a  torturing  motif.  The  portrait  became  detestable  to  her. 
She  hated  him,  she  would  hate  him  forever  as  the  man  who  had 
cruelly  revealed  to  her  that  love  and  his  base  brother  can  speak 
with  the  same  voice  and  hand. 

And  next  day,  when  a  box  of  glorious  and  penitent  blossoms 
was  followed  within  an  hour  by  Canning's  card  and  presence  at 
her  door,  the  girl's  resolution  to  see  him  nevermore  held  staunch. 

144 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


It  held  to  deny  him  a  second  time  on  the  afternoon  following. 
After  that  it  was  subjected  to  no  more  tests.  And  the  social  col 
umns  of  another  morning  made  it  known  to  the  general  public 
that  the  Paynes'  distinguished  house-guest  had  departed  for 
points  south. 


XII 


How  V.  Vivian  still  felt  the  Same  about  the  Huns,  No  Matter  what 
Sam  thought;  also,  how  Kern  Garland  lost  Something  at  the 
Works,  and  what  made  Mr.  V.  V.  look  at  her  That  Way. 

WHILE  Vivian  was  still  engaged  with  his  sick,  O'Neill, 
recently  returned  from  a  three  weeks'  industrial  tour 
of  the  State,  stuck  his  head  informally  through  the 
office  door. 

"Oh!  Busy,  hey?" 

"This  is  the  last,  I  think.  Step  into  the  waiting-room  and 
come  in  when  I  whistle." 

In  three  minutes  Vivian  whistled,  and  O'Neill  instantly  opened 
the  door.  It  looked  as  if  he  had  meant  to  come  in  just  then  any 
way,  and  he  had. 

"Say,  V.  V.!  —  step  out  here!"  he  said  in  a  low,  interested 
voice.  "There's  a  whiskered  bum  dodging  around  your  back 
hall  here,  and  if  I  'm  not  very  much  mistaken,  he 's  got  your 
Sunday  pants!" 

"It's  Mister,"  said  V.  V.,  looking  round  from  his  secretary. 
"Shut  the  door." 

"Oh!  —  Garland,  hey?  But  he's  swiped  your  best  pants!" 

"They  were  a  gift,"  said  V.  V.,  with  a  touch  of  soberness. 
"Sh!  He '11  hear  you." 

"Oh!"  said  the  Labor  Commissioner  again,  and  looked  a  little 
disappointed. 

He  shut  the  door  and  came  on  in,  a  substantial  figure  in  his 
glossy  suit.  It  was  the  3oth  of  January,  and  he  had  been  taking 
on  flesh  since  October. 

"  Well,  when  'd  he  blow  in?  Say,  he 's  a  ringer  for  Weary  Wag 
gles,  all  right." 

"Sometime  in  the  night,"  replied  the  young  man,  tilting 
back  in  his  swivel-chair.  "Mrs.  G.  found  him  in  the  entryway 

146 


V.    V. 's     Eves 


when  she  went  down  for  the  milk,  asleep  in  the  Goldnagels' 
hall-rug.  I'm  afraid  he's  only  come  to  be  outfitted  again,  and 
she  will  not  be  firm  with  him,  no  matter  what  she  promises.  .  .  . 
By  the  way,  they  were  not  my  best  trousers  at  all,  except  in 
a  sort  of  technical  sense.  Never  had  'em  on  but  once,  at  a  fune 
ral.  —  Well,  how  was  the  lunch  with  the  Governor?" 

The  Commissioner,  having  pushed  a  new  brown  derby  to  the 
back  of  his  head,  walked  about. 

"Pretty  good,"  said  he  —  "we  had  a  very  satisfactory  talk. 
One  of  his  cigars  I  'm  smoking  now.  I  told  him  what  I  'd  noticed 
around  the-  State,  and  gave  him  an  outline  of  the  legislation  I 
want  next  year.  Said  my  ideas  were  just  right.  Paid  me  some 
nice  compliments.  Speaking  of  legislation,"  added  the  Com 
missioner,  flicking  cigar-ash  on  the  bare  floor  with  a  slightly  ruf 
fled  air,  "  you'll  be  interested  to  hear  I've  been  down  to  Heth's 
since  I  was  in  the  other  day.  Saw  Heth  himself.  ..." 

The  doctor  remarked  that  he  had  been  thinking  of  Heth's,  not 
five  minutes  before. 

"  I  let  Corinne  go  back  to  work  this  morning,  you  see  —  not 
that  she 's  well  again  yet  by  a  good  deal,  or  that  that 's  the  place 
for  her  at  any  time.  However  .  .  .  You  saw  Mr.  Heth  himself?" 

"Yair.  I  saw  him  —  last  time  I'll  fool  with  him,  too!  Says 
he  guesses  the  law 's  good  enough  for  him.  Told  me  point-blank 
he  would  n't  spend  a  cent  till  he  had  to.  How  's  that  for  public 
spirit?" 

Having  halted  by  the  secretary,  the  Commissioner  looked 
down  at  his  friend  in  the  open  manner  of  a  speaker  confident  of 
sympathy. 

"  Trouble  is,"  said  the  friend,  frowning  and  sketching  circles  over 
some  yesterday's  memoranda,  "  Mr.  Heth  probably  does  n't  know 
anything  about  it  himself.  Got  a  lot  of  other  interests,  you  see. 
He  allows  that  blackguard  MacQueen  an  absolute  free  hand  at  the 
Works  —  takes  everything  he  says  for  gospel.  He  probably  — " 

"Don't  you  fool  yourself,  V.  V.!  Heth's  too  smart  a  man  to 
turn  over  his  principal  business  to  anybody.  And  I  'm  sick  and 
tired  of  jollying  with  him.  Say,  remember  that  letter  you  wrote 
in  the  'Post' last  fall?" 

147 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

It  appeared  that  V.  V.  did  recall  the  thing,  now  that  Sam  men 
tioned  it.  He  said  introspectively: 

"So  you  think  he's  still  got  a  grudge  about  that?  .  .  .  Well, 
I'm  sorry,  but  that  letter  was  all  true,  Sam,  absolutely  true, 
in  all  particulars.  .  .  .  Why,"  said  he,  "what's  the  use  of  talk 
ing?  You  can't  have  omelettes  without  breaking  eggs.  You  can 
not." 

"That's  right.  'S  what  I  came  to  talk  about.  Now,  what  do 
you  say  to  another  strong  letter  to-morrow,  right  in  the  same 
place.  These  —  " 

"  Another  letter!  ..." 

"You  betcher  —  hurt  their  feelings,  anyway,  if  it  don't  do 
anything  else.  I  guess  you  had  it  right,  that  a  heavy  dose  of 
public  opinion  is  —  " 

"Well,  no,"  said  V.  V.,  frankly  — "no Another  letter 

would  be  a  mistake,  at  just  this  stage  of  the  game  —  a  great 
tactical  blunder  — " 

"Why  d'you  think  that?"  said  Sam  O'Neill,  rather  taken 
aback. 

"  Why  do  I  think  it,  you  say?  Well,  I  — I  know  it." 

"Well,  I  don't  know  it.  It 's  a  blame  good  thing  to  make  these 
swell  obstructionists  feel  ashamed  of  themselves.  Let  'em  see 
their  names  right  in  print.  As  for  damages,  Heth  's  shown  that 
he's  afraid  to  go  into  court  — " 

But  V.  V.  waved  aside  the  idea  of  a  suit.  "The  whole  thing," 
said  he,  "is  merely  a  question  of  tactics.  Things  are  going  along 
very  satisfactorily  as  they  are.  There 's  a  drift  on,  a  tendency  — 
you  might  say.  The  clothing  people  have  come  in.  Magees  have 
come  in.  Why,  they've  agreed  to  do  every  blessed  thing  you 
asked  —  fireproofed  stairways  and  fire-doors,  ventilators  and 
rest-rooms — " 

"That  makes  the  attitude  of  these  others  all  the  worse.  I  tell 
you  they've  practically  told  me  to  go  to  hell." 

The  good-natured  Commissioner  spoke  with  a  rare  touch  of 
irritation.  To  have  bagged  all  four  of  the  offending  local  plants, 
without  the  aid  of  law  and  relying  only  on  personal  influence 
and  tactful  pressure,  would  undoubtedly  have  been  a  great 

148 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

card  for  the  O'Neill  administration.  Moreover,  Mr.  Heth's 
manner  of  superior  indifference  yesterday  had  been  decidedly 
galling. 

"Well,  give  'em  a  little  more  time,"  counselled  V.  V.,  lighting 
a  pipe  which  looked  as  if  it  had  had  a  hard  life.  "You  must 
make  some  allowance  for  their  point  of  view,  Sam.  Here 's  Mr. 
Heth,  just  to  take  an  example,  —  not  making  much  this  year, 
you  say,  and  mortgaged  up  pretty  well,  besides.  Well!  Just 
when  he 's  probably  getting  worried  about  his  book-keeping,  down 
you  drop  on  him  and  ask  him  as  a  favor  to  you  to  put  up  a  new 
building,  which  is  practically  what  — " 

"He'll  have  to  do  it,  too.  If  he  don't  do  it  now,  I'll  have  a 
law  next  year  that'll  get  him  right  in  the  neck." 

"  Exactly.  But  —  mark  my  words,  he  won't  wait  for  the  law, 
now  that  we  've  got  this  drift  going.  Don't  you  be  deceived  by 
what  he  may  say  now  in  —  in  pique.  Give  him  a  little  chance  to 
adjust  himself  to  the  new  idea,  that 's  all.  Rome  was  n't  built  in 
a  day,  Sam —  as  you've  said." 

"Look  here,  old  horse,  what's  struck  you?" 

"How  do  you  mean,  what's  struck  me?" 

The  two  young  men  gazed  at  each  other. 

"  You  're  pipin'  a  mighty  different  tune  than  you  were  when 
you  wrote  that  letter.  I've  noticed  it  for  some  time." 

The  look  of  the  fine-skinned  young  man  at  the  desk  changed 
perceptively.  O'Neill  was  made  to  feel  that  his  remark  was  in 
questionable  taste,  to  say  the  least  of  it. 

"I  wish  you  would  n't  speak  as  if  I  were  a  band  of  travelling 
bagmen.  I'm  not  piping  or  tuning  in  any  way.  I  say  now  pre 
cisely  what  I  've  said  all  along.  Rouse  these  people  to  their  respon 
sibilities,  and  you  can  tear  up  your  factory  laws!  Different  cases 
require  different  methods  of  — " 

"Why,  last  fall— " 

"Now,  Sam  —  here!  Arguing  's  no  good  —  I'll  tell  you  what. 
Suppose  you  just  leave  Heth's  to  me.  Go  ahead  and  hammer 
the  Pickle  people  if  you  think  that'll  do  the  slightest  good.  But 
you  leave  Heth's  to  me  for  a  while." 

"Well!  That's  an  order,"  said  the  Commissioner,  somewhat 

149 


V.    V.  's     E 


e  s 


derisively,  yet  looking  interested,  too.   "And  what  '11  you  do  with 
them?" 

"All  that  I  care  to  say  at  present,"  replied  the  tall  doctor, 
apparently  choosing  his  words  with  care,  "  is  that  I  —  ah  — 
feel  everything 's  going  to  work  out  very  satisfactorily  in  that 
quarter." 

O'Neill  stared  at  him,  the  gubernatorial  cigar  forgotten. 

"Oho!  .  .  .  You  Ve  met  the  Heths  personally?" 

"  I  've  met  some  of  them  personally,  as  you  call  it,  —  far  as  that 
goes." 

O'Neill,  puffing  again,  digested  this  information  speculatively 
Presently  he  looked  knowing  and  laughed. 

"Say,  remember  my  saying  to  you,  time  you  wrote  that  letter, 
that  if  you  knew  any  of  these  yellow  captains  and  horse-leeches* 
daughters  personally,  you'd  feel  mighty  different  — " 

"But  I  don't!  I  don't!  You  don't  seem  to  get  me  at  all, 
Sam.  I've  just  shown  that  my  position's  exactly  — " 

"  They  're  a  lot  of  Huns,  and  that 's  why  they  '11  shell  out  thou 
sands  and  modernize  their  plants  just  because  you  ask 'em?" 

The  two  men  eyed  each  other  again,  O'Neill  good-natured 
and  rather  triumphant.  V.  V.,  for  his  part,  was  smiling  just  a 
little  sternly. 

"Sam,"  said  he,  "you  thought  I  was  a  mad  ass  to  write  a 
letter  a  few  months  ago.  Now  time  passes  and  you  say  I  was 
quite  right,  and  won't  I  please  write  you  another  in  to-morrow's 
paper.  This  time,  I  tell  you  that  a  letter  will  only  do  harm  — 
great  harm  — " 

"  'Phone,  Doctor!"  bawled  a  husky  young  voice  from  below. 
"Aw,  Doctor!  'Phone!" 

"All  right,  Tommy!"  shouted  Doctor. 

Rising  to  his  height,  he  shot  at  O'Neill :  "And  once  more  you  '11 
see  I  'm  absolutely  right !  I  don't  change,  my  dear  fellow,  the  sim 
ple  reason  being  that  I  Ve  got  a  guiding  principle  that  does  n't 
change.  I  must  answer  that  'phone." 

"Well,  I  '11  trot  along  with  you.  I  've  got  to  get  on  up  the 
hill " 

They  headed  together  for  the  door.  By  reason  of  the  prohibi- 

150 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

tory  expense,  Dr.  Vivian  had  no  telephone  of  his  own,  but  through 
the  courtesy  of  Meeghan's  Grocery  just  across  the  street  (which 
establishment  was  in  receipt  of  medical  attendance  gratis),  the 
initiate  could  always  "get  a  message"  to  him.  Commissioner 
O'Neill,  at  once  puzzled  and  somewhat  impressed  by  his  friend's 
air  of  confidence,  resumed  concilia tively: 

"Now,  jokin'  aside,  V.  V.,  what's  the  proposition?  D' you 
honestly  think  Heth  can  be  made  to  clean  up  by  your  persuading 
his  wife  or  daughter  to  ask  him  to?  Is  that  it? — You  met  'em 
at  your  uncle's  reception,  I  s'pose?  " 

But  V.  V.'s  reserve  had  fallen,  like  a  mysterious  wall  between. 

"You  say  you're  at  the  end  of  your  rope,"  said  he,  stepping 
with  his  long  stride  into  the  hall.  "Well,  suppose  you  give  me 
a  few  months,  that's  all." 

The  two  friends  descended  the  long  stairs  in  silence.  Vivian's 
meditations  were  rather  tense.  He  recalled  the  hard  words  of  the 
Severe  Arraignment;  he  remembered  the  unforgivable  speech  he 
had  made  in  the  summer-house;  before  his  mind's  eye  rose  the 
moment  in  his  uncle's  lamplit  den  when  he  had  told  the  girl  to 
her  face  that  her  father  was  a  homicide.  Sacrificing  natural 
inclinations  to  kindliness,  he  had  done  and  said  these  things. 
And  Sam  O'Neill,  knowing  practically  nothing  of  the  facts  in 
the  case,  had  the  nerve  to  stand  up  ... 

O'Neill,  descending,  reflected  that  old  V.  V.  was  undoubtedly 
a  queer  one.  Chuck  full  of  hazy  optimism,  he  was  of  late.  Hazy 
optimism :  O'Neill  repeated  the  phrase,  liking  it.  Still  it  was  pos 
sible  he  might  manage  to  work  on  the  girl's  feelings  —  O'Neill 
was  sure  it  was  the  girl  —  whatever  that  was  worth.  He  was  a 
kind  of  appealing  fellow,  and  did  have  connections  with  the  swells, 
though  it  was  really  he,  O'Neill,  and  Mrs.  O.,  who  ought  .  .  . 

"Well,  be  good,"  said  he,  as  they  emerged  from  the  decayed 
grand  entrance.  "  I  'm  breakin'  in'  a  new  stenographer  —  trou 
bles  of  my  own.  See  you  again  in  a  day  or  two." 
.  "All  right.  And  by  the  way,"  said  the  tall  doctor,  speaking 
with  polite  restraint,  "please  don't  get  it  into  your  head  that 
I  'm  letting  up  on  these  people,  or  anything  of  that  sort.  As  a  mat 
ter  of  fact,  my  tendency  is  all  the  other  way.  Not  to  judge  them 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

too  harshly  —  not  to  do  the  —  the  most  serious  injustice  — 
that 's  what  I've  got  to  guard  against.  ..." 

He  turned  away,  bareheaded  in  the  mild  January  sunshine, 
and  crossed  to  Meeghan's,  where  his  telephone  call  proved  to 
be  from  Rev.  Mr.  Dayne,  desiring  a  personal  conference  later 
in  the  day.  Cumbered  with  many  cares  though  he  was,  the  kind- 
faced  Secretary  of  Charities  had  been  captured  at  sight  by 
Vivian's  plan  of  buying  the  old  Dabney  House,  and  bringing  it 
to  life  again  as  a  great  Settlement.  The  problem  now  engrossing 
both  was  how  to  raise  the  necessary  money,  twenty-five  thou 
sand  dollars  being  a  large  sum,  particularly  with  the  benevo 
lent  field  just  swept  clean  by  the  Associated  Charities  canvass. 
However,  the  tireless  Secretary  seldom  despaired,  V.  Vivian  never. 
The  young  man  promised  eagerly  to  call  on  Mr.  Dayne,  whom, 
in  common  with  most  of  the  rest  of  the  world,  he  admired 
immensely. 

Hanging  up  the  receiver,  Vivian  purchased  a  five-cent  box 
of  blacking,  a  commodity  not  ranking  among  Meeghan's  best 
sellers,  and  returned  to  make  ready  for  his  professional  rounds. 
In  the  closet  of  his  bedroom,  where  he  went  for  hat  and  coat, 
he  was  struck  with  the  brooding  sense  of  something  lost,  and 
readily  recalled  the  episode  of  the  trousers.  He  became  con 
scious  of  a  certain  feeling  of  destitution.  Undoubtedly  the 
whole  question  of  new  clothes  would  have  to  be  taken  up  seri 
ously  some  day.  For  the  present  there  did  not  lack  a  sense  of 
economic  precariousness:  it  was  he  and  these  trousers  against 
the  world.  .  .  . 

While  brushing  his  hat  in  the  bedroom,  Vivian  wondered  if 
Mister  had  yet  donned  the  gift  articles,  and  how  he  looked  in 
them.  He  fell  to  musing  about  Kern's  erring  parent,  thinking 
what  a  strange  life  he  led.  It  was  many  and  many  a  year  ago 
since  Mister  and  society  had  parted  company;  and  through  all 
this  time,  it  was  certain  that  every  hand  had  been  against  him. 
In  many  cities  he  had  stood  before  sarcastic  judges,  and  been 
sent  on  to  serve  his  little  time.  Adown  highways  unnumbered 
he  had  sawed  wood,  when  necessary;  received  handouts,  worn 
hand-me-downs;  furnished  infinite  material  for  the  wags  of  the 

152 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

comic  press.  Long  he  had  slept  under  hedges  and  in  ricks,  carried 
his  Lares  in  a  bandana  kerchief,  been  forcibly  bathed  at  free 
lodging-houses  in  icy  winters.  Dogs  had  chased  him,  and  his 
fellow  man:  he  had  been  bitten  by  the  one  and  smitten  by  the 
other.  Ill-fame  and  obloquy  had  followed  him  like  a  shadow. 
And  yet  —  so  strong  and  strange  are  our  ruling  passions  — 
nothing  could  wean  him  from  the  alluring  feckless  ways  which 
had  heaped  all  these  disasters  upon  him.  .  .  . 

Thus  and  otherwise  philosophizing,  V.  Vivian  slipped  on  his 
overcoat  (which  had  so  far  escaped  Mr.  Garland's  requisitions) 
and  flung  wide  the  office  windows  to  rid  his  chambers  of  the  medi 
cal  smell.  He  had  had  a  busy  morning,  his  habit  of  having  no 
billheads,  while  regarded  as  demoralizing  by  professional  breth 
ren  of  the  neighborhood,  being  clearly  gratifying  to  the  circum 
ambient  laity.  It  was  now  getting  toward  noon,  and  the  doctor 
was  in  a  hurry.  Besides  calls  on  his  sick,  he  was  very  anxious  to 
get  uptown  before  dinner  and  inquire  after  his  uncle  Armistead 
Beirne,  who  had  lain  ill,  with  a  heavy,  rather  alarming  illness, 
since  a  day  or  two  after  his  New  Year's  reception.  This  call 
was  purely  avuncular,  so  to  say,  Mr.  Beirne  employing  a  reli 
able  physician  of  his  own.  .  .  . 

The  young  man  picked  up  his  doctor's  bag  and  opened  the  door. 
At  the  far  end  of  the  long  hall,  where  the  Garlands'  apartments 
were,  he  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  skirt,  just  whisking  out  of  sight. 
He  thought  he  recognized  the  skirt,  which  was  a  red  one,  and 
called,  in  surprise: 

"Corinne!" 

There  was  no  answer. 

"Corinne!"  he  called,  louder.   "Is  that  you?" 

Sure  enough,  Kern's  face  peeped  out  of  a  door,  a  long  distance 
away. 

"It's  me,  and  it  ain't  me,"  she  cried,  mockingly.  "I  'm  here 
in-cog" 

And  her  head  bobbed  back  out  of  sight  again. 

"What 're  you  talking  about?"  called  Vivian  into  the  empti 
ness.  "Did  you  feel  too  weak  to  work?" 

"Like  in  the  books,"  said  Kern,  and  stuck  her  head  out  again 

153 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

with  a  giggle.  "Why,  I  thank  you  kindly,"  she  went  on  in  a 
mincing  stage  voice.  "I'm  feeling  very,  very,  very  well,  my  Lord 
Dook,  Mr.  V.  V.  On'y  I  decided  I'd  spend  to-day  lazyin'  at  my 
writin'-desk,  readin'  over  my  billy-doox  from  peers  of  the  rel- 
lum,  'stead  of  working  my  hands  and  legs  off  in  that  nasty, 
nasty,  NASTY — " 

"Stop  that  cuckoo-clock  nonsense!"  called  Mr.  V.  V.,  starting 
to  walk  towards  her.  "  What  are  you  doing  here,  I  say?  " 

"I'm  helping  mommer  soak  colliflower,  Mr.  V.  V.  Honest!" 

"But  why  didn't  you  stay  at  the  Works?  Come,  stop  this 
foolishness,  Corinne,  and  answer  me  sensibly." 

The  girl's  cheek  rested  against  the  door-facing.  She  stopped 
her  foolishness. 

"Mr.  V.  V.,  I'm  fired." 

A  bullet  would  not  have  stopped  Mr.  V.  V.'s  advance  more 
abruptly. 

"You 're  WHAT?" 

Kern  nodded  slowly  a  number  of  times.  "  I  was  n't  goin'  to 
tell  you  till  I  got  me  another  job,  and  maybe  never,  on'y  you 
caught  me — " 

"  Come  here,"  said  Mr.  V.  V.  in  rather  a  queer  voice.  "Walk," 
he  added,  as  she  began  to  take  the  long  hall  at  a  skip. 

Kern  came  at  a  walk.  Eyeing  Mr.  V.  V.  as  she  drew  near,  she 
soon  made  out  that  he  was  taking  it  even  harder  than  she  had 
expected.  She  herself  had  accepted  the  loss  of  her  position  with 
the  easy  fatalism  of  the  poor,  though  it  was  a  serious  enough 
matter,  in  the  slack  midwinter  and  following  three  weeks  of 
idleness.  However,  after  her  sex,  her  present  overweening  in 
stinct  was  to  erase  that  sort-of- white  look  from  Mr.  V.  V.'s  face. 

"It's  on'y  some  of  that  sickenin'  MacQueen's  foolishness," 
she  called  out  from  some  distance  away  —  "and  I  was  tired  of 
workin'  in  that  old  nasty  place  anyway.  Up  and  said  he  did  n't 
have  no  job  for  me.  Did  n't  have  a  job  for  me.  So  I  just  laughed 
at  him  and  stayed  round  a  little  while,  havin'  a  good  time,  and 
then  he  happened  up  to  the  bunchin'  room  and  told  me  to  git. 
So  I  gitted.  .  .  .  Lor,  Mr.  V.  V. !  I  can  find  all  the  good  places  / 
want.  Goodness  me,  sir!  I  '11  get  more  orfers  of  jobs  — " 

154 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"Come  into  the  office,"  said  Mr.  V.  V.,  turning  back. 

In  the  office,  Kern,  acting  under  medical  instruction,  sat  down 
on  the  horsehair  lounge  with  one  leg  gone,  and  told  her  simple 
story  in  detail. 

In  these  weeks,  while  she  had  gone  down  with  mild  pleurisy, 
been  successfully  "tapped"  and  haled  back  to  something  like 
an  economically  valuable  condition,  the  work  of  the  world  had 
marched  on.  That  another  operative  sat  now  on  Kern's  stool 
and  manipulated  Kern's  machine  might  appear  natural  enough, 
as  the  superintendent,  it  seemed,  had  insisted  with  his  sour  smile. 
But  this  was  not  to  consider  Kern's  exceptional  skilfulness,  known 
and  recognized  throughout  the  Heth  Works.  Replace  a  girl  who 
could  bunch  sixty-five  hundred  cheroots  in  a  single  day?  No,  no, 
you  could  hardly  do  that.  .  .  . 

For  this  dismissal  there  was  an  explanation,  and  it  was  not 
hidden  from  the  young  physician.  He  spoke  slowly,  struggling 
not  to  betray  the  murder  in  his  heart. 

"The  devil's  doing  this  because  he  knows  you're  a  friend 
of  mine.  He  hits  you  to  punish  me.  ...  By  George,  I  '11  show 
him!" 

The  intensity  of  his  face,  which  in  all  moods  looked  somehow 
kind-of-sorrowful  to  her,  made  Kern  quite  unhappy.  She  was 
moved  by  a  great  desire  to  soothe  Mr.  V.  V.,  to  conjure  a  smile 
from  him.  .  .  . 

"Lor,  Mr.  V.  V.!  What  do  you  and  me  care  for  his  carryin's 
on  ?  We  can  get  on  heaps  better  without  him  than  he  can  with 
out  Me!  The  Consolidated  '11  jump  down  my  throat — " 

"You  are  going  back  to  the  Works,"  spoke  Mr.  V.  V.,  in  his 
repressed  voice. 

"  Oh ! "  replied  Kern,  trying  not  to  look  surprised.  "  Well,  then, 
all  right,  sir,  Mr.  V.  V.  Just  whatever  — " 

"I'll  give  him  one  chance  to  take  you  back  himself.  I'll 
assume,  for  his  sake,  that  there 's  a  misunderstanding.  ...  If  he 
refuses,  so  much  the  worse  for  him.  I  shall  know  where  to  go 
next." 

"Oh!  —  You  mean  John  Farley?" 

It  was  a  shrewd  guess.  John  Farley,  sometime  of  the  sick, 

155 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


and  ever  a  good  friend  of  the  Dabney  House,  was  known  to  hold 
past-due  "  paper,"  of  the  hard-driving  Heth  superintendent. 

But  Mr.  V.  V.,  continuing  to  speak  as  if  something  pained  him 
inside,  only  said,  "I  was  not  thinking  of  Farley.  ..." 

The  young  man  stood  silent,  full  of  an  indignation  which  he 
could  not  trust  himself  to  voice.  Yet  already  he  was  beginning  to 
put  down  that  tendency  to  a  too  harsh  judgment  which,  as  he 
himself  admitted,  was  his  besetting  sin.  .  .  .  Perhaps  there 
was  some  misunderstanding:  this  contemptible  business  hardly 
seemed  thinkable,  even  of  MacQueen.  At  the  worst,  it  was 
MacQueen  personally  and  nobody  else.  No  argument  was  needed 
to  show  that  the  owners  would  not  for  a  moment  tolerate  such 
methods  in  their  Works.  Merely  let  them  know  what  sort  of 
thing  their  superintendent  was  up  to,  that  was  all.  O'Neill 
should  see.  .  .  .  Mr.  Heth,  to  be  sure,  he  did  not  happen  to 
know  personally.  .  .  .  ^jj i 

"Well,  then.  That's  all  settled,"  Kern  was  saying,  eagerly, 
"and  I  '11  go  back  to  MacQueen  or  not  go  back,  just  which 
ever  you  want  me,  and  don't  less  think  about  him  any  more. 
Oh,Mr.V.V.—  " 

"He  can  consider  himself  lucky  if  he  does  n't  lose  his  job  for 
this  day's  work." 

"Mr.  V.  V.,  what  d' you  think?"  cried  Kern;  and  having 
caused  him  to  turn  by  this  opening,  she  fixed  him  with  grave 
eyes,  and  hurried  on:  "Well,  there  was  a  man  here  named  Avery, 
and  he  was  ridin'  his  automobile  slow  down  a  dark  road  and 
his  lamps  went  out.  And  there  was  two  men  walkin'  down  the 
road,  and  he  ran  over  one  of  them.  So  he  turns  back  to  see  if  the 
man  was  hurted,  and  the  road  bein'  so  dark  he  runs  over  him 
again.  So  he  turns  back  again,  scared  he  had  killed  him,  and  then 
the  other  man  that  had  hopped  into  the  ditch,  he  sings  out  to 
his  friend,  'Get  up,  you  damn  fool,  he's  comiti  back!" 

Having  quite  failed  to  follow  Kern's  cheer-up  narrative,  Mr. 
V.  V.'s  stare  remained  blank,  engrossed;  but  presently  he  was 
caught,  first  by  the  silence,  then  by  his  little  friend's  wide  and 
intensely  expectant  gaze,  just  beginning  to  fade  into  childlike 
disappointment.  He  promptly  burst  into  a  laugh.  It  began  as 

156 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

a  dutiful  laugh,  but  Kern's  expression  soon  gave  it  a  touch  of 
genuineness. 

" Ha,  ha ! "  said  he.  " That 's  a  good  one!  Well,  where  on  earth 
did  you  get  that  one?" 

"Off  Sadie  Whirtle!"  cried  Kern;  and  springing  up  gleefully 
from  the  sofa,  began  to  pirouette  and  kick  about  the  bleak 
office. 

The  young  man  watched  her,  buttoning  his  overcoat,  his  spe 
cious  merriment  dying.  .  .  .  For  all  the  high  wages  she  earned, 
the  Works  was  of  course  the  last  place  on  earth  for  her;  but 
for  the  moment  that  did  not  happen  to  be  the  point. 

"Was  it  not  bein'  a  lady  to  say  the  word  like  he  did?"  said 
Kern,  swaying  about  and  waving  her  arms  like  wings.  "I  told 
Sadie  Whirtle  it  was  n't  netiquette,  but  Sadie  she  said  it  was  n't 
funny  without  you  used  the  swear.  And  I  did  want  to  make 
you  laugh.  .  .  .  She  druther  be  funny  than  netiquette,  Sadie 
said." 

The  young  man  picked  up  his  bag  again,  his  face  intent.  "  I  'm 
late  with  my  calls,"  said  he.  "  Tell- your  mother  that  I  may  n't 
be  back  for  dinner." 

"  Sadie  she  heard  a  lady  say  damn  once  right  out,  a  customer 
in  the  store,  in  a  velvet  suit  — ' 

"Now  stop  that  foolish  dancing,  Corinne." 

Kern  stopped  dancing.  She  still  looked  a  little  pale  from  her 
illness,  which  had  cost  her  seven  pounds.  That  morning  she  had 
donned  her  working-clothes  expectantly,  but  she  had  changed 
since  coming  in,  and  that  accounted  for  her  favorite  red  dress. 
The  dress  was  a  strict  copy  of  the  slender  mode;  she  looked  very 
small,  indeed,  in  it.  She  wore  a  brave  red  ribbon  in  her  hair,  a 
necklace  of  red  beads,  and  a  long  gilt  chain  which  glittered 
splendidly  as  she  moved. 

"What  makes  you  look  at  me  that  way,  Mr.  V.  V.?" 

The  young  man  gave  a  small  start  and  sigh. 

"  You  must  take  better  care  of  yourself,  Corinne,"  said  he,  from 
the  depths  of  troubled  thought.  "I  shall  certainly  do  something 
better  for  you  later  on.  That  I  promise." 

"Why,  I  feel  very,  very  well,  Mr.  V.  V.,  truly." 

157 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"You're  much  too  clever  and  pretty  to  be  wearing  your  life 
out  at  this  sort  of  thing.  .  .  .  Much  too  dear  a  little  girl.  ..." 

Kern  turned  away.  Mr.  V.  V.  had  never  said  such  a  thing  to 
her  before,  and  he  now  made  a  mental  note  that  he  must  be  care 
ful  not  to  do  it  again.  He  had  honestly  intended  only  a  matter- 
of-fact  statement  of  simple  and,  on  the  whole,  pleasant  truth; 
but  Kern,  with  her  sensitiveness  and  strange  delicacy,  too  clearly 
felt  that  he  had  taken  a  liberty.  All  her  gaiety  died;  her  cheek 
seemed  to  flush  a  little.  She  walked  stiffly  past  Mr.  V.  V.  to 
the  door,  never  looking  in  his  direction. 

"I'll  go  soak  the  colliflower,  sir,"  she  murmured,  and  slipped 
away  into  the  hall. 


XIII 

How  Life  was  Gray  and  Everything  was  Horrid;  how  Carlisle  went 
to  Little  Africa  with  Hen;  how  the  Man  spoke  to  her  again,  just  the 
same,  and  what  happened  then;  further,  reporting  a  Confidential 
Talk  with  a  Best  Girl-Friend. 

HEARING  the  whir  of  a  slowing  motor  behJnd  her,  and 
her  name  called  besides,  Henrietta  Cooney  checked  her 
practised  pedestrian's  stride  and  looked  back  over  her 
shoulder.  The  Heth  car,  with  Carlisle  alone  in  it,  rolled  abreast 
of  her  at  the  curb. 

"What  on  earth  are  you  doing,  Hen,"  asked  her  cousin,  but 
hardly  as  if  the  matter  interested  her  much  —  "up  here  at  this 
time!" 

"Servant  chasing!"  cried  Hen,  gaily.  "My  favorite  outdoor 
sport.  Hortense  's  left  us.  I  got  out  early  on  purpose.  You  're 
looking  mighty  well,  Cally." 

Cally  made  a  weary  little  face,  which  seemed  to  say  that  such 
matters  as  looks  were  very  far  from  being  of  interest  to  her.  It 
happened  to  be  the  fact,  indeed,  that  she  had  never  felt  more  de 
pressed  and  bereft  in  her  life:  witness  her  hailing  Hen  Cooney, 
whom  she  had  never  cared  much  for,  and  less  than  ever  after  the 
way  Hen  had  shown  her  real  nature  about  the  Works.  Time's 
chances  had  brought  her  to  this,  that  she  preferred  Hen's  society 
above  the  company  of  her  own  thoughts.  Gray  and  empty  had 
been  Cally's  days  since  a  New  Year's  moment  in  the  library.  .  .  . 

"But  you'll  not  find  any  servants  up  here,  my  dear!  —  unless 
you  expect  to  throw  bags  over  their  heads  and  kidnap  them?" 

"I'd  like  to,"  laughed  Hen,  friendly  elbows  on  the  car  door. 
"And  then  give  them  the  bastinado  every  hour  on  the  hour. 
Think  of  Hortense's  doing  us  so  when  we've  all  been  perfect 
mothers  to  her  for  a  year.  But  I  've  come  up  here  just  to  get  an 

159 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

address,  from  Mrs.  J.  T.  Carney,  and  now  I'm  off  to  Little 
Africa,  pleasant  but  determined." 

"Jackson  Ward?" 

"No,"  said  Hen,  producing  and  consulting  a  scrap  of  paper, 
"it's  South  Africa  this  time  —  io6A  Dunbar  Street.  You  know 
—  down  along  the  Canal." 

"Hop  in,"  said  Cally,  listlessly.  "I'll  drive  you  down  there." 

"Perish  the  thought!"  ejaculated  Hen,  in  some  surprise. 
"You  don't  want  to  go  exploring  the  slum  districts,  finding  out 
how  the  other  half  lives.  I'll  like  the  walk  — " 

But  Carlisle  insisted,  being  out  only  because  she  was  bored 
with  being  in,  and  Hen  hopped  in,  not  altogether  reluctantly. 
By  request  she  repeated  the  Ethiopian  address  to  the  chauffeur, 
himself  of  that  tongue  and  nation;  and  off  the  cousins  bowled. 

"Bored?  How's  this,  Cally?  I  hear  on  all  sides  that  it's  the 
gayest  winter  in  ten  years.  You  're  not  tired  of  parties,  at  your 
age?" 

"Oh,  I'm  crazy  about  them,"  said  Cally,  indifferently,  yet 
drawing  comfort  from  the  sound  of  her  own  voice.  "But  one 
can't  have  parties  every  hour  of  the  day,  you  know.  There  are 
always  chinks  to  be  filled  up,  and  that  is  where  one's  background 
comes  in.  My  background  has  a  violent  attack  of  indigestion 
just  now.  Everything 's  horrid.  —  Ohh  !  Why  will  a  dog  take 
chances  like  that?  .  .  ." 

"How's  Uncle  Thornton?"  said  Hen,  holding  her  hat  on  with 
a  hand  that  looked  hard-worked.  "  I  don't  believe  I  've  seen  him 
since  that  day  we  all  came  to  dinner  — " 

"  Oh,  he 's  well,  I  suppose,  but  he 's  out  of  spirits  a  good  deal  of 
the  time,  which  I  will  say  is  unusual  for  papa.  I  think  he 's  pro 
bably  worried  about  business  or  ...  Who  was  that  old  man  that 
stared  at  me  so?  He  looked  as  if  I  ought  to  know  him." 

"Where?"  said  Hen,  glancing  back.  "Oh!  —  there  under  the 
tree?  Why,  that's  Colonel  Dalhousie.  You  know  — " 

"Oh!"  said  Cally,  immediately  regretting  having  spoken.  To 
relieve  the  baldness  of  her  exclamation,  she  added:  "I  thought 
he  was  a  rather  younger  man  than  that." 

"He's  broken  dreadfully  in  the  last  few  months  —  that's 

160 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


probably  why  you  did  n't  recognize  him,"  said  Hen,  cheeringly. 
"They  say  the  poor  old  man's  grieving  himself  to  death." 

Through  Cally  quivered  an  angry  wonder  why  it  was  that  only 
disagreeable  things  happened  nowadays.  Why,  why,  when  every 
thing  else  was  just  as  abominable  as  possible,  need  that  old  man 
go  prowling  around  the  streets,  stopping  on  corners  to  stare  at 
her?  .  .  . 

She  went  on  quickly  with  a  tinge  of  light  bitterness  in  her 
voice: 

"I'm  sure  it  must  be  business,  for  there's  a  hard- times  atmo 
sphere  hanging  over  the  house,  all  of  a  sudden,  and  mamma  is 
constantly  remarking  that  there 's  a  limit  to  my  extravagance, 
etc.,  etc.  She  and  I  happen  to  be  on  dreadfully  formal  terms 
just  at  present,  which  is  another  of  the  joys  of  home.  And  to  cap 
the  climax,"  she  added,  with  a  burst  of  confidence  only  half 
mocking,  "I'm  in  an  absolutely  suitorless  condition  —  not  a 
blessed  swain  to  my  name!  I  was  never  so  destitute  and  forlorn 
in  my  life!" 

Hen,  struck  from  the  beginning  with  the  unusual  note  in  her 
brilliant  cousin's  manner,  laughed.  She  perceived  that  Cally 
wished  to  talk  about  herself,  and  talk  complainingly,  and  Hen 
did  n't  mind. 

"  First  time  I  ever  heard  such  a  complaint  in  this  quarter.  Is 
J.  Forsythe  Avery  dead  without  my  knowledge?  " 

"J.  Forsythe  is  in  New  York.  Robert's  in  the  sulks.  James 
Bogue,  2d,  is  in  bed  —  measles,  if  you  please.  .  .  .  Do  you  ever 
have  the  horrible  nobody-loves-you  feeling?  Rather  odious, 
is  n't  it?" 

"Ghastly,"  said  Hen. 

"I  '11  be  awfully  glad  to  get  away  next  month,"  continued 
Cally.  .  .  . 

Interested  by  the  hiatus  in  Cally's  list  of  missing  swains,  Hen 
desired  that  this  conversation  should  go  on.  Like  most  people, 
the  Cooneys  had  of  course  heard  of,  and  gossiped  about,  the  open 
breach  between  their  cousin  and  Mr.  Canning  a  month  ago, 
promptly  followed  by  the  great  young  man's  departure  from 
town.  Through  the  masculine  half  of  the  local  world,  it  was 

161 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

generally  assumed  that  Miss  Heth  had  actually  rejected  Mr. 
Canning.  It  was  a  rare  tribute  to  the  girl's  attractions  that 
not  a  few  women  also  believed  this,  even  though  Cally's  best 
girl-friends,  like  Mattie  Allen,  were  perfectly  sure  nothing  of 
the  sort  had  happened.  ... 

Hen,  a  Cooney,  had  had  a  special  reason  for  wondering  if  this 
interesting  affair  might  not  be  "on"  again.  However,  Cally, 
skipping  the  conversation  along,  was  talking  now  of  the  visit  she 
had  in  prospect  to  her  friend,  Mrs.  Willing,  Florence  Stone  that 
was,  in  New  York.  Florrie,  she  informed  Hen,  wanted  her  par 
ticularly  for  the  Lenten  weeks,  promising  that  they  would  spend 
the  sober  penitential  season  in  a  hilarious  round  of  theatres, 
restaurants,  and  shops.  It  appeared  that  this  promising  invitation 
had  come  only  that  morning,  and  Cally  described  it  as  a  direct 
answer  to  prayer. 

"Goodness,  Cally!  You  talk  as  if  you  lived  in  a  special  kind 
of  purgatory,"  said  Hen.  "I  don't  know  anybody  that  has  a 
better  time  than  you." 

"Is  an  everlasting  round  of  gaieties,  all  exactly  alike,  your 
idea  of  a  perfect  time?  What  is  the  point  or  meaning  of  it  all?" 
demanded  Cally,  the  philosopher.  "The  whole  trouble  with  me," 
she  added,  explanatorily,  "is  that  I  have  n't  budged  from  home 
in  three  months,  and  I'm  simply  bored  deaf  and  dumb." 

Hen  might  have  replied  that  she  had  n't  budged  for  three 
years,  but  what  was  the  use?  She  said  instead:  "When 're  you 
going  to  sail  for  Europe.  May?" 

"It  remains  to  be  seen  whether  we  sail  at  all  or  not,"  answered 
Carlisle,  with  a  sudden  mocking  little  laugh.  "Mamma  talks 
several  times  a  day  of  cancelling  our  passage  and  shipping  me 
off  to  Aunt  Helen's  farm  for  the  summer.  She  's  been  tremend 
ously  droll  with  me  of  late.  .  .  ." 

Droll,  of  course,  was  only  the  girl's  derisive  euphemism.  The 
truth  was  that  mamma's  attitude,  since  hearing  of  the  extraor 
dinary  rupture,  —  which  her  daughter  refused  either  to  explain 
or  amend  instantly,  —  had  been  nothing  short  of  violent. 
Jangling  scenes  recurred  daily.  .  .  .  Perhaps,  indeed,  it  was 
mamma's  relentless  pressure  that  had  brought  about  the  gradual 

162 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

shifting,  amounting  to  a  total  revolution,  in  Cally's  own  attitude. 
More  probably,  though,  it  was  only  the  inevitable  resurgence  of 
her  own  sane  fundamental  purposes,  temporarily  swept  away  by 
purblind  passion. 

It  is  one  thing  to  kick  out  your  symbol  of  happiness  in  a  burst 
of  senseless  rage.  It  is  quite  another  to  learn  to  live  day  by  day 
without  it.  ...  Why,  indeed,  should  she  not  yield  obedience  to 
poor  mamma  —  at  the  least  greet  Canning's  return  with  some 
mark  of  forgiveness,  a  tiny  olive-branch?  .  .  . 

Henrietta  Cooney's  voice  spoke,  singularly  apropos: 

"  You  don't  seem  to  be  the  only  one  who's  been  bored  lately, 
Cally  —  that  ought  to  comfort  you !  Chas  and  I  saw  Mr.  Can 
ning  yesterday,  and  he  looked  bluer  than  indigo.  Mad,  too!" 

Surprise  betrayed  Carlisle  into  a  naked  display  of  interest. 
Turning  with  a  little  jump,  she  stared  at  Hen  with  a  kind  of 
breathless  rigidity. 

"You  saw  Mr.  Canning  yesterday!  .  .  .  Where?" 

"Why,  out  on  the  old  Plattsburg  Turnpike,"  said  Hen,  certain 
now  that  the  affair  was  not  on  again  —  "near  the  Three  Winds 
Road.  We  happened  to  be  taking  a  walk  out  there,  and  he 
dashed  by  on  that  beautiful  big  bay  mare  of  Mr.  Payne's,  going 
like  a  runaway..  He  did  n't  look  happy  a  bit.  .  .  .  You  knew 
he  was  here,  I  suppose?  " 

By  a  very  special  effort,  Carlisle  had  recaptured  her  poise:  it 
was  not  her  habit  to  confide  her  troubles  to  anybody,  least  of  all 
to  a  Cooney. 

"Oh,  no!"  she  answered  in  a  voice  of  careless  frankness.  "I 
don't  know  the  first  thing  about  his  movements  any  more." 

"Well,  it  seems  he  only  came  for  over  Sunday.  A  friend  of  Mr. 
Payne's  told  Chas  he  was  here,  on  Saturday.  He  went  off  again 
on  the  noon  train  to-day." 

"Oh!.  ..  Did  he?" 

"Looloo  saw  him  at  the  station.  She  happened  to  be  there, 
meeting  a  friend  of  hers." 

Gone !  —  He  had  come,  not  seen  her,  and  gone !  .  .  .  A  wave 
of  bitterness  swept  through  Cally,  impelling  her  to  hit  out  at 
somebody. 

163 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Of  course.  Is  n't  it  funny  how  your  family  always  sees  and 
hears  everything?" 

But  Hen  answered,  entirely  unmoved,  in  fact  with  an  air  of 
modesty:  "Any  family  can  do  it  who  keep  their  eyes  and  ears 
open.  For  instance,  good  old  Looloo  heard  where  he  checked  his 
baggage  to:  Palm  Beach,  if  it's  of  any  interest  to  you." 

"I  don't  believe  it  is,  my  dear.  He  '11  be  checking  it  back  this 
way  again  very  soon,  I  've  no  doubt.  Are  we  going  the  right  way 
for  Dunbar  Street?" 

Hen  shot  at  her  a  look  of  unconscious  admiration.  Her  pretty 
cousin's  indifferent  air  seemed  to  support  the  theory  that  she 
had  actually  rejected  the  prince  of  partis,  which,  in  fact,  was 
exactly  what  it  was  meant  to  do.  Hen  had  never  really  thought 
that  Cally  had  it  in  her.  She  threw  her  alert  eye  around  to  see 
where  they  were.  The  car  had  turned  south  at  Twelfth  Street, 
had  crossed  Centre,  and  was  now  rolling  into  a  quarter  of  the 
town  very  different-looking,  indeed,  from  Washington  Street. 
Hen  said  they  were  all  right  for  Dunbar  Street  and  told  Cally 
to  cheer  up.  Much  worse  was  coming,  Hen  said. 

There  was  nothing  personal  in  Hen's  admonition,  but  the  truth 
was  that  Cally,  gazing  fixedly  at  the  passing  sights,  felt  any 
thing  but  cheerful  at  this  moment.  The  Cooneys'  tidings  were 
staggering  in  their  way. 

What  was  the  meaning  of  Mr.  Canning's  mysterious  flying 
visit?  That  it  had  to  do  with  her  she  did  not  question ;  and, 
tensely  meditating,  she  presently  found  a  hypothesis  not  unsat 
isfying  after  its  kind.  He  had  come  with  the  hope  that  she 
would  at  last  make  some  generous  overture  toward  a  reconcili 
ation.  More  direct  advances,  after  her  three  galling  rebuffs  of 
him,  he  naturally  could  not  bring  himself  to  make.  Yet  he  had 
taken  a  long  journey  merely  to  put  himself  in  her  way  —  perhaps 
counting  on  a  chance  meeting,  more  probably  expecting  that 
she,  hearing  of  his  presence,  would  this  time  extend  the  sweet 
olive.  The  wormwood  in  it  was  that  she  would  have  been  per* 
fectly  willing  to  extend  the  olive  if  she  had  only  known.  .  .  . 

The  car,  pushing  through  a  mean  and  shabby  neighborhood, 
offensive  to  refined  eyes,  ears,  and  nostrils,  now  turned  into  a 

164 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


narrow  street  brisk  with  the  din  of  business,  but  by  no  means 
lovely  to  look  upon.  Recalling  the  Cooney  presence,  Cally  sud 
denly  stirred  with  the  deadly  self-protective  instinct  of  her  sex, 
and  directed  Hen  to  cease  instantly  all  thinking  about  her  and 
Mr.  Canning.  She  did  it,  needless  to  say,  scientifically,  by  saying 
with  just  the  plausible  degree  of  interest: 

"I  meant  to  ask  you  —  what  on  earth  was  the  trouble  with 
Hortense,  Hen?  I  supposed  she  was  a  perfect  fixture  with  you, 
an  institution!" 

"What's  the  trouble  with  all  the  servants  in  this  town?"  cried 
Hen.  "I  tell  you,  Cally,  I  don't  know  what 's  going  to  become  of 
us.  Why  .  .  ." 

She  launched  with  zest  upon  the  somewhat  unoriginal  thesis, 
and  Cally  relapsed  into  her  own  thoughts,  which  were  full  of 
rebellion  at  the  bitter  untowardness  of  her  fate.  .  .  . 

Much  water  had  flowed  under  the  bridge  of  sighs  since  the  part 
ing  in  the  library.  Passed  long  since,  it  seemed,  was  that  uprush 
of  burning  humiliation;  subdued  was  the  betraying  flare-up 
(mamma's  favorite  word  nowadays)  —  vanished  to  thin  air  like 
a  midsummer  madness,  delirium's  delusion,  hardly  possible  to 
understand,  much  less  recapture,  now.  A  day  had  hardly  passed, 
after  the  second  rejection  of  Mr.  Canning  at  her  door,  before  the 
thought  of  whistling  him  back  again  flashed  luringly  across  Car 
lisle's  mind.  She  repelled  the  thought,  but  it  recurred,  and  she 
came  to  dally  with  it,  ably  assisted  in  that  direction  by  mamma. 
What  had  he  done  to  warrant  such  absurd  melodramatics?  .  .  . 
More  and  more  her  mind  haoffastened  upon  the  genuine  tender 
ness,  the  emotion,  the  man  had  shown  in  his  last  moment  with 
her.  In  love  with  her  without  quite  realizing  it  himself,  he  had 
in  the  moment  of  parting  been  swept  away  by  his  feelings,  and 
had  taken  a  not  strictly  authorized  kiss  or  two.  What  Sir  Gala 
had  among  men  was  proof  against  such  a  tripping  in  the  presence 
of  lovely  and  irresistible  temptation?  .  .  . 

"Hortense  gave  you  no  notice  at  all?"  she  demanded  out  of  a 
dream. 

"Did  you  ever?  Why,  honestly,  Cally  ..." 

He  was  to  pause  once  again,  to  bid  the  Paynes  farewell,  on 

165 


V.    V.  's     E 


yes 


his  final  progress  back  to  what  he  had  once  called  lights  and  home. 
That  would  be  in  April,  said  Cousin  Willie  Kerr,  when  his  six 
months'  sentence  ran  out.  The  distant  promise  brought  the  girl 
no  comfort  now.  Why,  really,  should  she  not  take  this  new 
opportunity  he  had  given  her,  and  dispatch  him  a  little  note, 
saying  in  a  friendly  way  that  she  had  wanted  to  see  him  again? 
By  day  after  to-morrow,  he  could  be  at  her  side.  .  .  . 

It  was  a  little  note  that  mamma,  though  ignorant  of  the 
circumstances,  had  so  specially  recommended  in  the  desolate 
weeks;  had  commanded,  offered  bribes  for,  cried  for  with  real 
tears,  blustered  and  threatened  for  with  a  purpling  birthmark. 
In  her  own  mind  the  girl  had  already  worded  many  which  met 
the  situation  with  merely  a  front  of  sweet  generosity,  carrying 
no  forfeiture  of  dignity,  no  real  acknowledgment  of  surrender. 
What  was  the  fibre  of  foolish  hardness  in  her  that  resisted  all 
mamma's  importunities,  all  her  own  urgent  wisdom? 

"Five  years  ago,"  said  Hen,  "we  paid  eight  dollars  a  month, 
and  got  really  good  ones.  Now  the  greenest  of  them  holds 
you  up  for  twelve  and  fourteen.  Hortense  was  simply  bribed 
off. .  .  ." 

Cally  roused,  glancing  about.  "Papa  says,"  she  observed, ab 
sently,  "it  will  all  end  in  something  like  the  French  Revolution. 
Heavens!  What  a  perfectly  sickening  street!" 

"Isn't  it?"  said  Hen,  cheerfully.  "Yet  it's  interesting  too, 
Cally,  for  this  is  where  the  city  makes  all  its  money." 

Money-making,  indeed,  Canal  Street  looked.  Long  processions 
of  trucks  rolled  up  and  down  it,  giving  motorists  more  time  than 
they  desired  to  look  about.  All  around  them,  as  the  car  moved 
slowly  on,  were  warehouses,  new  and  old  cheek  by  jowl  together; 
commission  merchants,  their  produce  spilled  over  the  sidewalk; 
noisy  freight  yards,  with  spur-tracks  running  off  to  shipping- 
rooms  of  all  descriptions;  occasional  empty  ground  used  as 
dumps,  littered  with  ashes  and  old  tin  cans;  over  all  a  thousand 
smells,  each  more  undelectable  than  the  last. 

But  April!  You  might  as  well  say  in  another  life.  How  could 
she  ever  get  through  the  days  till  then?  .... 

"I'm  glad  you're  interested,"  she  said  aloud,  sharply,  think- 

1 66 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


ing  that  this  was  exactly  what  came  of  giving  a  lift  to  the 
Cooneys.  "I  think  it's  simply  disgusting.  .  .  .  Get  us  through 
this,  William." 

"It's  familiar,  at  any  rate.  Let's  see.  Dunbar  must  be  the 
next  street  over  but  one,  is  n't  it?  " 

Cally,  lifting  a  handkerchief  to  obliterate  the  adjacent  odors 
of  a  gas-tank,  said:  "I  have  n't  the  smallest  idea." 

"  Why,  don't  you  like  the  rattle  of  business,  Cally?  Don't  you 
like  the  bustle,  the  fine  democratic  air?  —  Why,  hello  I  There  's 
V.  V.!" 

Carlisle's  head  turned  at  once. 

"He's  signalling  us,"  said  Hen,  waving  back;  and  she  nervily 
added:  "Stop,  William!" 

Following  Henrietta  Cooney's  look,  Carlisle's  eyes  fell,  sure 
enough,  upon  the  tall  figure  of  Dr.  Vivian  crossing  the  humming 
side-street  straight  toward  them.  Her  glance  caught  him  in 
the  act  of  removing  his  derby,  bowing  in  response  to  the  cheeky 
salute  of  Hen.  .  .  . 

"  Ah,  he  's  using  a  cane,"  added  Hen,  below  her  breath.  "  That 
means  his  foot  is  bad.  ..." 

"But  he  has  no  right  to  signal  me"  said  Carlisle.  "Drive  on, 
William." 

But  she  herself  unconsciously  spoke  in  an  undertone,  and  the 
order  appeared  to  be  lost  in  the  enveloping  din.  William,  all  but 
blockaded  anyway,  had  come  to  a  halt.  Coincidentally  sounded 
the  voice  of  Hen,  the  pachyderm: 

"Hello,  V.  V.!  What 're  you  doing  way  down  here  in  the 
wilds?  Not  visiting  the  sick,  without  your  little  black  bag?" 

V.  Vivian  stood  bareheaded  at  the  side  of  Mr.  Heth's  (of  the 
Works)  shining  car. 

"How'do,  Henrietta?  —  Oh,  good  afternoon,  Miss  Heth.  No, 
I  —  I'm  down  here  on  other  business  this  time.  .  .  ." 

Carlisle,  her  eyes  about  on  a  level  with  the  young  man's  inter 
esting  piscatorial  necktie,  had  acknowledged  his  greeting  by  the 
smallest  and  frigidest  inclination  of  her  head.  That  done,  feel 
ing  outraged  by  this  whole  proceeding,  she  at  once  looked  osten 
tatiously  in  another  direction. 

167 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

The  lame  doctor,  for  his  part,  appeared  a  little  embarrassed 
by  the  rencontre,  or  perhaps  excited,  one  or  both. 

"I —  it's  a  very  fortunate  coincidence,  meeting  you  in  this 
way,"  he  began  at  once.  "The  fact  was,  I  —  ah  —  was  just 
thinking  of  you  at  that  moment,  Miss  Heth,  —  wishing  very 
much  to  see  you  — " 

Miss  Heth  turned  her  pretty  head  once  more,  this  time  with 
a  sort  of  jerk.  So  the  man  pretended  to  have  forgotten  that  she 
had  ordered  him  not  to  address  her  again. 

Now  her  eyes  fully  met  those  of  Dalhousie's  friend,  and  in  that 
meeting  she  was  conscious  of  an  odd  little  shock,  almost  like  a 
physical  impact.  .  .  .  Why  was  it  that  this  impossible  man,  with 
his  ridiculous  opinions,  his  wicked  untruths,  and  his  face  so  full 
of  a  misplaced  hopefulness,  kept  coming  like  a  destiny  across  and 
across  her  path?  What  was  her  silly  weakness,  that  he  never 
looked  at  her  with  those  quite  misrepresentative  eyes  without 
making  her  angry  and  unhappy?  . .  . 

She  felt  herself,  as  it  were,  turning  pale  inside,  but  into  her 
cheeks  there  sprang  a  cold  color. 

"You  wished  to  see  me?" 

"Well,  do  put  on  your  hat,  V.  V.,"  interjected  Hen,  matter 
of  fact,  but  glancing  round  at  Cally's  voice.  "You'll  catch 
pneumonia. ..." 

"Yes  —  thank  you.  ...  I'd  like  to  enlist  your  help,  if  I  could, 
Miss  Heth.  I've  just  come  from  the  Works,  you  see,"  he  hur 
ried  on  with  curious  intensity  —  "where  I  went  to  try  to  right 
what  seems  to  be  a  clear  injustice.  I  wonder  —  do  you  remem 
ber  the  girl  I  happened  to  mention  to  you  at  my  uncle's  that 
night,  —  a  buncher  here  at  the  Works?  ..." 

His  expression  said  that  he  was  counting  on  her  remembering. 
The  girl  in  the  car  was  looking  him  through  and  through.  Hen 
Cooney  disappeared  from  between  them;  the  roar  of  traffic  faded 
away. 

"No,  I  don't  remember,"  said  Miss  Heth,  biting  her  lip  a  little. 

"Oh!  —  the  girl  I  wanted  the  marrons  for?  Well,  it's  no  mat 
ter,"  the  tall  young  man  said,  with  a  belying  look  of  youthful 
disappointment.  But  he  went  on  with  undiminished  eagerness: 

168 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"She's  one  of  the  best  operatives  in  the  Works,  I  assure  you — 
a  really  valuable  employee  because  she  can  get  more  work  out 
of  a  machine  than  any  two  inexperienced  girls.  She 's  had  over 
two  years'  practice,  you  see.  This  morning  she  reported  again 
for  work  after  nearly  a  month's  illness  in  bed:  she 's  had  pleurisy. 
Well,  MacQueen  —  the  superintendent  —  declines  to  give  her 
her  place  back." 

"Why,  what  a  shabby  trick!"  cried  Hen 

She  looked  as  if  she  desired  to  say  much  more,  but  she  saw  that 
V.  V.'s  eyes  were  fixed  on  Cally,  whose  father  owned  MacQueen, 
and  forbore. 

Cally's  breast  rose  and  fell.  She  saw  what  was  coming  now.  .  .  . 
How  did  he  dare  —  he  who  had  so  maligned  her  personally,  who 
had  so  maliciously  thrown  bricks  at  papa  and  the  Works  —  how 
did  he  dare  to  turn  and  beg  favors  from  the  objects  of  his  slan 
ders?  This  was  the  supreme  impertinence.  Now  she  would  say 
to  him  what  would  destroy  him  from  her  ways  forever.  .  .  . 

V.  Vivian  was  hurrying  on,  as  if  perceiving  that  he  had  n't 
made  the  matter  fully  plain  as  yet:  "It  is  quite  a  serious  thing  for 
her,  because  she  can  make  more  at  the  Works  than  anywhere 
else  —  she 's  a  born  buncher.  And  she  and  her  mother  are  de 
pendent  on  her  earnings.  It  seems  a  —  a  great  hardship  that 
she  should  be  thrown  out  this  way,  without  any  fault  of  her 
own.  . .  ." 

"Put-on-your-hat!"  ordered  Hen,  sotto  wee;  and  again  re 
pressed  further  remarks  seething  within  her. 

The  slum  doctor,  having  neglected  Hen's  injunction  hitherto, 
now  obeyed  it,  though  with  inattention  to  the  processes.  He 
continued  speaking,  blind  to  all  discouragements.  .  .  .  Would  no 
one  stop  the  God's  fool,  rushing  with  eager  eyes  to  his  doom?  .  .  . 

"I  don't,  of  course,  like  to  trouble  you.  But  don't  you  think 
you  could  stop  a  moment,  and  say  just  a  word  to  MacQueen  — 
or  to  your  father  if  he  is  in?  .  .  . " 

Now  was  the  moment  to  demolish  the  irrepressible  fanatic, 
who  seemed  incapable  of  understanding  that  his  betters  wanted 
none  of  him.  And  strange,  oh,  strange!  — Cally  Heth  sat  si 
lent.  ...  As  the  man  reached  the  climax  of  his  madness,  the 

169 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

girl's  hard  challenging  gaze,  as  if  by  some  miracle  of  his  min 
istering  angels,  had  suddenly  wavered  and  broken.  Her  eyes 
flitted  from  his  face,  rested  fixedly  on  a  hideous  sprawling  pile 
on  the  corner  ahead,  an  abode  of  trade  exceptionally  repellent  to 
all  the  senses.  However,  she  was  unaware  of  the  detestable 
object,  so  confused  was  she  by  the  odd  frustrating  weakness 
that  suddenly  possessed  her,  staying  her  hand  in  the  act  of  de 
livering  the  mace-blow.  It  might  be  the  very  superlativeness 
of  the  man's  temerity  that  disarmed  her,  paralyzing  the  hot 
will.  It  might  be  merely  that  ludicrous  trusting  look  in  his 
eyes,  which  somehow  seemed  to  put  him  in  the  non-combatant 
class,  like  some  confiding  child.  .  .  . 

"  I  know,  of  course,"  he  was  concluding  with  unfaltering  ex 
pectancy,  "a  word  from  you  will  make  everything  right  at 
once." 

And  Carlisle,  her  glance  returning  toward  him,  but  not  to 
him,  heard  with  disquiet  and  mortification  her  own  voice  saying, 
not  indignantly  at  all: 

"You  will  have  to  speak  to  my  father  about  it  if  —  if  injustice 
has  been  done.  I —  I  haven't  time  to  go  to  the  Works  now  —  " 

"Time!"  cried  Hen  Cooney,  at  last  assuming  control  of 
things.  "Why,  good  heavens,  Cally!  It  would  n't  take  us  any 
time  I  We  're  right  there  now !  —  and  don't  you  think  Uncle 
Thornton  ought  to  be  told  how  that  brute  's  behaved  .  .  ." 

Hen  intended  only  an  argument;  but  it  happened  that  her  ex 
plosive  statement  sprang  out  like  a  switchman,  finally  shifting 
the  train  of  the  talk. 

"  Oh ! "  said  Cally,  staring  bewildered  at  her  cousin.  "  Why  — 
where  are  the  Works  —  from  here,  I  mean?  ..." 

Hen's  strange  look  confirmed  her  own  confused  conviction 
that  she  was  appearing  at  an  annoying  disadvantage  all  at 
once.  And  forebodings  possessed  her,  as  of  one  walking  wide- 
eyed  into  unsuspected  .perils. 

"You  are  lost,  Cally,  indeed.  Why,  my  dear,  we're  right  on 
the  corner  of  Seventeenth  and  Canal  now  —  they're  leaning 
right  up  against  your  nose.  There!" 

Following  Hen's  nod,  Cally's  gaze  rested  again  on  the  some- 

170 


V.    V.  's     E  y  e  s 


what  displeasing  pile  on  the  corner,  this  time  with  a  seeing 
eye.  Her  fascinated  stare  took  in  with  one  sweep  a  dirty  ram 
shackle  building  of  weather-worn  gray  brick,  spilling  over  the 
sidewalk  and  staggering  away  (as  it  looked)  down  the  littered 
side-street:  rather  a  small  building,  obviously  old,  certainly  not 
fragrant,  quite  sinister-looking  somehow.  .  .  . 

The  girl  felt  as  if  the  skies  were  falling.  She  perceived  that 
there  was  some  mistake.  "Oh ...  You  mean  that  is  part  of  them? 
But  the  —  the  main  part,  I  suppose,  is  — " 

"No,  this  is  all  there  is  of  'em,  Cally!"  said  Hen,  suddenly 
with  a  kind  note  in  her  voice.  And  she  waved  upward  toward 
a  wire  screen  atop  the  ancient  building,  where  large  black  letters 
spelled  out: 

THE  HETH   CHEROOT  WORKS 

"Is  that  the  Works?"  breathed  the  daughter  of  the  Works, 
with  a  sort  of  stunned  incredulity. 

In  her  utter  bewilderment,  she  was  confused  into  glancing 
at  Jack  Dalhousie's  friend,  who  stood  silent  upon  the  side 
walk,  two  yards  away.  Thus  she  surprised  his  translucent  eyes 
fixed  upon  her  with  a  look  which  she  had  seen  there  on  two  other 
remembered  occasions.  The  eager  confidence  had,  indeed,  faded 
from  his  face,  but  not  as  she  had  designed  that  it  should  fade. 
The  man  had  the  grace  to  look  away  at  once,  seeming  embar 
rassed:  but  in  one  glance  she  saw  that  he  had  read  to  the  heart 
of  what  she  felt,  thus  discovering  the  real  birthplace  of  her 
Family.  And  his  eyes  had  said  to  her,  quite  plainly,  that  of 
course  he  would  not  on  any  account  ask  her  to  stop  now;  and 
that,  on  the  whole,  God  must  pity  her  again  for  a  poor  little 
thing  who  did  not  even  know  where  and  how  her  own  father 
made  his  money.  .  .  . 

She  could  have  cried  for  the  angry  mortification  of  this  mo 
ment,  but  perhaps  that  confrontation  steadied  her  as  nothing 
else  could  have  done.  She  said  hurriedly,  but  with  some  degree 
of  naturalness: 

"Well  —  it  certainly  is  n't  pretty  —  Hen!  But  I  don't  sup- 

171 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


pose  factories  usually  are.  You  know,  I  —  have  n't  happened  to 
be  down  here  for  a  good  many  years.  ..." 

And  then,  catching  the  driver's  eye,  she  nodded  sharply  to 
him  to  go  on.  In  the  cross-sweep  of  larger  troubles,  dismissed 
bunchers  were  naturally  forgotten.  The  car  started  with  a  little 
jump. 

"Why,  are  n't  you  going  to  stop?" 

It  was  Hen  Cooney  who  thus  sounded  the  note  of  rather  in 
dignant  surprise,  not  the  man  from  the  slums,  who,  understand 
ing,  stood  tall  and  silent,  lifting  his  old  derby.  .  .  . 

Cally,  looking  straight  ahead,  replied:  "I  can't  stop  now." 

That  left  the  whole  matter  indeterminate;  nobody  was  com 
mitted  to  anything,  one  way  or  another.  Hen  Cooney  earned 
Cally's  undying  resentment  (at  least  for  the  remainder  of  the 
drive)  by  crying  over  her  shoulder  as  the  car  rolled  away: 

"Of  course  Uncle  Thorn  ton '11  give  her  her  place  back!  Don't 
you  worry,  V.  V.!  ..." 

That  night  the  subject  of  the  Works  was  touched  upon  again, 
in  the  course  of  an  extended  talk  between  Carlisle  and  her  friend 
Mattie  Allen,  a  talk  ranging  intimately  over  various  aspects  of 
life  and  living.  It  took  place  in  Carlisle's  pretty  bedroom,  toward 
two  o'clock  A.M.  In  the  earlier  evening  the  girls  had  brilliantly 
attended  the  Thursday  German  (which  was  always  held  on 
Mondays),  and  now  Mattie  was  spending  the  night:  a  ceremony 
which  she  dearly  loved,  especially  the  eleven  o'clock  breakfast  in 
bed.  They  routed  all  hands  out  at  eight  at  the  Aliens,  regardless. 

The  two  girls,  Carlisle  and  Mattie,  were  the  dearest  friends 
in  the  world,  being  perfect  natural  foils,  each  made  to  appear  at 
her  best  by  the  presence  of  the  other.  Many  other  bonds  they 
had  also,  as  the  fact  that,  while  each  was  charming  and  most  at 
tractive  to  men,  they  very  rarely  attracted  the  same  men,  thus 
obviating  hostile  jealousies.  Speaking  roughly,  tall,  athletic, 
handsome,  normal  young  men  loved  Carlisle;  while  Mattie, 
though  rarely  appealing  to  these  demigods,  made  instant  killings 
with  "clever"  men,  literary  fellows,  teachers  of  Greek,  and 
promising  young  entomologists.  Doubtless  the  comparatively 

172 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

favorable  impression  Mattie  had  made  on  Mr.  Canning  at  the 
Beirne  reception  was  due  to  the  fact  that  he,  though  a  demigod, 
had  thought,  at  times,  of  writing  a  book.  .  .  . 

"Mats,"  said  Carlisle,  apropos  of  nothing  whatever,  "have 
you  ever  heard  people  criticizing  the  Works  —  saying  horrid 
things  about  conditions  being  unhealthy  there,  or  anything  of 
that  sort?" 

"Why,  yes,  dear,  I  have,"  said  Mats  at  once,  and  sweetly. 
"Not  very  lately,  though.  I  think  there  was  an  article  in  the 
paper  about  it,  was  n't  there,  a  month  or  two  ago?  Why?" 

"What  have  you  heard  people  say?"  replied  Carlisle. 

"Well,  I  can't  remember  exactly,  Cally,  but  it  seems  to  me 
I  heard  them  say  the  Government  was  going  to  have  a  new  law 
about  it,  or  something.  Why?" 

This  last  was  a  popular  word  with  Mattie,  whose  mind  in  re 
lation  to  her  own  sex  was  distinctly  interrogatory.  All  evening, 
mostly  by  indirect  methods,  she  had  been  examining  Carlisle 
in  regard  to  Mr.  Canning,  and  his  strange  visit.  .  .  . 

"Oh,  nothing,"  said  Carlisle,  gently  patting  her  face  with  a 
steaming  cloth. 

Mattie  selected  a  hairbrush  from  her  little  spend-the-night 
kit. 

"You  know  what  perfect  nuts  it  is  to  people,"  said  she,  "to 
think  they  have  anything  the  least  bit  disagreeable  on  people  they 
know." 

"Is  n't  it?"  replied  Carlisle,  with  a  repressed  note  of  strong 
irritation.  "Everybody  has  plenty  of  time  to  attend  to  every 
body's  business  but  their  own." 

*  Mattie  glanced  at  her,  wondering  interestedly  what  had  hap 
pened  to  Cally.  However,  she  made  no  answer  to  the  philo 
sophic  sarcasm,  being  now  engaged  in  giving  her  hair  one  hun 
dred  and  twenty-five  brisk  strokes  before  retiring,  and  not  wishing 
to  lose  the  count. 

Half  an  hour  the  girls  had  been  in  the  flowing  negligee  stage, 
but  they  were  still  intensely  busy  with  the  Eleusinian  myste 
ries. 

After  an  interval  Carlisle  said:  "I  wonder  how  many  of  the 

173 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

people  who  criticize  would  put  Turkish  baths  and  —  and  dens 
in  the  Works  if  they  had  to  do  it  out  of  their  own  pockets.  .  .  . 
Why  under  the  sun  should  they?" 

"Of  course,"  said  Mattie.  "  (Eighteen,  nineteen,  twenty.)  — 
I  think  you're  perfectly  right,  dear.  .  .  ." 

"If  people  don't  like  the  Works  as  they  are,  why  should  they 
raise  heaven  and  earth  begging  for  jobs  there?  I  wish  somebody  'd 
explain  that." 

"Of  course.  (Twenty-five.)  —  And  how  could  Mr.  Heth  spend 
thousands  and  thousands  of  dollars  on  such  things  without  tak 
ing  it  right  out  of  your  mouth,  don't  you  see?  .  .  .  Oh,  gosh!" 

"What?" 

"Broke  my  best  finger-nail  —  that's  all!  Just  the  tiniest  rap 
on  the  chair.  Where  's  the  file,  dear?  Oh,  Cally,  remember, 
twenty-five.  .  .  .  How  provoking !  —  I  do  think  I  Ve  got  the 
brittlest  I  ever  saw  ..." 

Presently  Carlisle,  in  a  flowing  silken  robe,  rose,  went  over  to 
her  dressing-table,  seated  herself  and  picked  up  a  round  cut-glass 
jar  with  a  silver  top.  The  jar  contained  cold  cream,  or  something 
of  that  sort.  Mattie,  having  filed  down  her  nail,  was  now  faith 
fully  brushing  again,  in  the  forties.  Her  eyes  followed  Cally; 
rested  upon  her  as  she  sat.  These  eyes,  large,  dark,  and  grave, 
with  the  sweetest,  curlingest  lashes,  had  been  the  turning-point 
in  Mattie's  life.  She  had  early  recognized  their  unique  merits  and 
values,  and  round  them,  with  infinite  pains,  she  had  built  up  her 
"type."  And  now  at  twenty-three,  she  was  sweet,  artless,  and 
full  of  adorable  intellectual  dependences,  deliciously  stupid  (with 
the  spectacled  young  men),  and  her  favorite  expression  was 
"poor  little  Me." 

Mattie,  brushing,  looked  at  Carlisle,  and  wondered  if  she  pos 
sibly  had  refused  Mr.  Canning,  and,  if  so,  why  Mr.  Canning  had 
skipped  back  just  to  stay  over  Sunday  and  not  go  near  her,  and 
why  Cally  was  so  mysterious  and  secretive  all  of  a  sudden.  She 
always  told  Cally  every  single  thing  about  her  affairs,  reporting 
in  detail  what  was  "the  most"  each  man  said  to  her,  and  always 
bringing  her  their  letters  to  read,  even  Mr.  Dudley's,  who  wrote 
such  perfectly  beautiful  ones.  Cally  had  always  done  the  same 

174 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

with  her,  till  lately,  but  now  she  was  a  perfect  clam.  Not  a  word 
would  she  tell  about  Mr.  Canning,  and  to-night  J.  Forsythe 
Avery  had  proposed  at  last  (Cally  said),  but  she  barely  mentioned 
the  fact,  as  if  it  were  of  no  interest,  and  declined  positively  to 
repeat  his  words,  which  was  always  the  interesting  (and  also 
the  convincing)  part  of  it.  ... 

"What's  the  matter?"  said  Mattie,  aloud  and  alertly. 

Cally,  sitting  and  rubbing  cold  cream  (or  whatever  it  was) 
had  suddenly  given  a  long  sigh.  At  her  friend's  question,  she 
turned  half  round,  but  did  not  cease  the  rubbing. 

"  Mats,  don't  you  ever  get  sick  and  tired  of  all  these  things 
we  do  to  ourselves  to  make  us  look  pretty  and  attractive  and  — 
desirable?" 

Mattie,  looking  rather  shocked,  said:  "Why,  what  things  do 
you  mean?" 

"  Oh,  these  things !  .  .  .  Massage  and  manicure  and  primp !  — 
hot  baths  and  lotions  and  primp !  —  sleep  and  a  little  exercise  to 
make  pink  cheeks  and  primp  some  more.  Hours  and  hours  every 
day  just  to  coddling  our  little  bodies !  Is  n't  it  all  rather  sickening, 
when  you  really  stop  to  think?  " 

"I  must  say,"  answered  Mattie,  quite  stiffly,  "I  can  see  no 
thing  sickening  about  it.  I  think  it 's  a  woman's  duty  to  look  just 
as  well  as  she  can." 

Carlisle  rested  her  arm  on  her  chair-back,  and  went  on*  rub 
bing. 

"Duty?  —  I  wonder.   Duty  to  whom,  do  you  mean?" 

"To  everybody,  to  the  world,  to  society." 

"I  was  just  trying  to  think,"  said  Cally,  "and  it's  quite  fun. 
I  believe  I  '11  do  it  at  least  once  a  week  after  this.  — What  would 
we  think  of  a  man  who  spent  four  hours  a  day  decorating  him 
self,  everlastingly  working  at  himself  to  look  pretty?" 

Mattie  opened  her  wide  eyes  yet  wider.  She  was  now  plaiting 
her  well-brushed  hair,  and  looked  very  sweet  and  girlish. 

"  Why,  that 's  a  very  different  thing,  Cally !  The  same  qualities 
are  n't  expected  of  men  and  women — or  they  could  n't  comple 
ment  each  other!  Women  are  expected  to  be  sweet  and  attractive, 
while—" 

175 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Expected  by  whom?"  quizzed  Cally,  and  screwed  the  top 
down  on  her  cold  cream  (if  such,  indeed,  it  was). 

"By  everybody,"  said  Mattie,  falling  back  upon  her  tried 
phrase,  "by  the  world,  by  — " 

"Why  shouldn't  it  be  expected  of  men  to  look  nice,  too, 
just  as  much?  Why  should  we  have  to  do  the  whole  per 
formance?  Why  should  n't  we  give  some  of  all  this  time  to 
something  useful,  as  men  do?  —  cultivating  our  minds,  for  in 
stance?" 

"But  don't  you  sec,  Cally?  —  that  isn't  expected  of  us! 
Men  simply  do  not  care  for  clever  women,"  cried  Mattie, 
who  had  built  up  a  considerable  social  success  on  that  very 
principle. 

"Why  should  we  let  them  decide  for  us  what  we're  to  be? 
Why?  — Why?  That's  just  what  they  do!  We're  human  be 
ings  just  as  much  as  they  are,  are  n't  we?  .  .  .  Oh,  I  'm  sick  of 
men,"  cried  Cally. 

" You  're  sick  of  men!"  echoed  Mattie,  aghast  as  at  a  blas 
phemy. 

Cally  nodded  slowly,  her  lovely  eyes  on  her  friend's  tremulous 
face. 

"Oh,  it's  the  men  who  make  us  put  in  all  this  time  tricking  up 
ourselves  to  look  pretty.  You  know  it,  too,  for  you  just  gave 
yourself  away.  .  .  .  Oh,  Mats,  would  n't  it  be  great  to  appeal 
to  somebody  sometimes  in  some  other  way!" 

Mattie,  apparently  on  the  verge  of  tears,  murmured  her  com 
plete  inability  to  follow  Cally's  strange  talk.  Observing  her,  Car 
lisle  gave  a  reassuring  little  laugh  and  rose  abruptly.  Not  that  it 
made  any  special  difference,  but  she  did  n't  care  about  setting  her 
best  friend's  alert  wits  too  busily  to  work. 

"  Dear  old  Mats !  —  Don't  take  me  so  dreadfully  seriously. 
It's  all  what  I  read  in  a  magazine  article  to-night  before  the 
German,  waiting  for  Robert  to  come.  He  thought  he  was  dis 
pleased  with  me,  and  came  very  late,  on  purpose.  You  don't 
seem  to  like  it?" 

"I  don't  like  to  hear  you  talk  so,  Cally,  even  in  fun,"  replied 
dear  old  Mats,  rather  stiffly.  "You've  been  strange  all  evening, 

176 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


and  you  told  me  you  did  n't  care  whether  you  ever  saw  Mr.  Can 
ning  again  or  not.   It  is  n't  a  bit  like  you." 

"It  certainly  isn't,  as  mamma  frequently  remarks,"  said 
Cally,  her  laugh  dying.  "Well,  I'm  going  to  be  just  like  myself 
after  this,  never  fear.  .  .  .  Gentlemen  always  welcome.  We  strive 
to  please." 

She  put  an  arm  over  her  friend's  shoulder,  and  in  this  true- 
friendship  attitude  they  strolled  through  the  little  entry  and 
connecting  bath  to  the  spare-room  at  the  back  where  Mattie 
always  spent  the  night. 

"I  feel  terribly  sorry  for  poor  Mr.  Beirne,"  said  Mattie,  in  a 
just  voice.  "You  know  he  had  a  sinking-spell,  and  they  were 
saying  to-night  he  can't  possibly  get  well." 

"Yes,  I  know,"  said  Carlisle,  stifling  a  yawn.  "By  the  way, 
I  must  leave  cards  there  to-morrow.  Remind  me.  Climb  in,  dear. 
I'll  tuck  you  in." 

"I  have  n't  said  my  prayers,"  said  Mattie,  standing  by  the 
bed.  "  Cally,  suppose  he  dies  and  leaves  a  lot  of  money  to  that 
cunning  nephew  of  his!  You  know  —  Dr.  Vivian  —  that  I  intro 
duced  to  you  that  night  at  his  house?  They  say  Mr.  Beirne 's 
terribly  fond  of  him." 

Cally  nodded  in  reply,  her  gaze  entirely  blank.  It  appeared 
that  in  this  world  there  was  escape  neither  from  the  nephew  nor 
from  the  topic  of  him. 

"But  what  do  you  suppose  he'd  do  with  it,"  queried  Mattie, 
who  was  a  dear  romantic  thing  —  "living  off  down  there  in  the 
Dabney  House?  Somebody  told  me  he  did  n't  care  at  all  for 
money,  only  think!" 

"Perhaps  he'd  feel  differently  if  he  had  any,"  said  Cally. 
"Papa  says  coming  into  money's  a  sure  cure  for  Socialism  and 
everything  of  that  sort." 

"Why,  don't  you  think  he's  terribly  sincere?  .  .  .  Don't  you 
think  lame  people  usually  are,  somehow?" 

"My  dear  child,  I  don't  see  why  I  should  think  about  him  at 
all.  Besides,  Mr.  Beirne  will  leave  his  money  to  the  Masons. 
Now  for  some  beauty  slumber  —  I'm  quite  ready  for  it,  too! 
Sleep  well,  Mats  dear." 

177 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

They  kissed,  and  parted  for  sweet  dreams.  At  the  door,  Cally, 
pausing,  said: 

"Oh,  Mats,  go  with  me  to  Madame  Smythe's  to-morrow? 
I'm  buying  things  for  New  York." 

But  Mats  could  not  reply,  being  already  at  her  devotions.  .  .  . 

In  her  own  room,  Cally  prayed  briefly  with  preoccupied 
thoughts,  and  rising,  removed  her  thin  blue  robe,  switched  out  the 
lights,  raised  shades  and  windows.  In  the  quiet  street  below,  a 
cat  trotted  silently,  swallowed  up  as  she  watched  in  an  immense 
flickering  shadow  from  the  tall  street  light.  The  girl  stood  a 
moment,  looking  down,  a  strange  wish  in  her  heart. 

She  wished  for  a  confidante,  some  one  to  tell  her  troubles  to. 
Mamma,  of  course,  was  impossible  in  this  connection;  you  never 
told  things  to  mamma,  and  besides,  they  were  barely  on  speak 
ing  terms  most  of  the  time  now.  Mattie  was  hardly  less  out  of 
the  question:  a  girl  with  many  excellent  merits  and  her  best 
friend,  but  the  last  person  you  would  ever  dream  of  giving  your 
self  away  to.  But  then  you  really  could  not  trust  anybody  as  far 
as  that.  In  all  the  world  there  was  no  one  to  whom  she  could  go 
and  freely  pour  out  her  unhappiness  and  her  heart. 

A  self-contained  and  self-sufficient  girl,  she  now  felt  lonesomely 
that  it  would  be  a  great  comfort  to  talk  everything  over  with 
somebody.  Things  seemed  only  to  get  worse  by  being  kept  locked 
up  so  tight  in  her  own  bosom.  Everything  was  changing  so,  just 
in  a  little  while;  you  could  not  go  by  the  old  landmarks  any  more. 
Only  a  few  weeks  ago  life  had  been  more  serene,  more  secure  and 
halcyon  than  ever  before.  Now,  as  from  the  clouds,  one  hard 
stroke  fell  after  another;  old  established  certainties  exploded  with 
a  bang  all  about.  Nothing  seemed  to  be  fixed  or  to  be  relied 
upon  any  more,  nothing  seemed  to  be  settled.  How  had  she  fal 
len  only  this  afternoon,  supposing  herself  high-born  of  great  insti 
tutions,  to  find  herself  in  the  turning  of  an  eyelash  merely  the 
creature  of  an  ugly  little  rattletrap !  .  .  .  But  no,  —  no !  That 
was  simply  ridiculous.  Business  was  like  that.  No  one  had 
aver  really  supposed  that  a  factory  could  possibly  be  anything 
different  .  .  . 

Agitating  such  matters  as  these,  Cally  Heth  got  into  bed  and 

178 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


pulled  up  the  covers.  She  repelled  the  thought  of  the  Works,  as 
she  had  done  all  evening.  Nevertheless  the  last  thing  she  thought 
of  as  she  dropped  off  to  sleep  was  Dr.  Vivian,  as  he  stood  and 
looked  up  at  her  from  the  dingy  sidewalk.  She  wondered  whether 
she  would  have  agreed  to  speak  to  papa  about  that  girl,  if  only 
the  Works  had  n't  looked  so  awful.  .  .  . 


XIV 

In  which  Cally  tells  a  Certain  Person  that  she  is  n't  Happy  —  very. 

THE  question  recurred  next  day.  The  strange  ubiquity  of 
the  nephew  persisted.  When  Carlisle  called  about  noon  to 
"inquire"  after  her  respected  neighbor,  who  had  lain  four 
weeks  in  mysterious  coma,  her  ring  was  answered  and  the  door 
opened  by  young  Dr.  Vivian.  He  had  seen  her  coming,  through 
the  window. 

"Oh!  —  good-morning,  Miss  Heth!"  said  he,  in  a  manner  in 
dicating  the  experiment  of  pleased  surprise,  tempered  with  a  cer 
tain  embarrassment.  .  .  .  "  What  a  glorious  day  outdoors,  is  n't 
it  ?  —  almost  spring.  .  .  .  Won't  you  come  in?  " 

Miss  Heth  replied,  as  she  would  have  replied  to  the  housemaid 
(who,  indeed,  could  herself  be  spied  just  then,  pausing,  down  the 
dimness  of  the  hall) : 

"  Good-morning.  No,  I  stopped  to  ask  how  Mr.  Beirne  is  to 
day.  We  hope  there  is  better  news?  " 

The  young  man  stepped  at  once  out  into  the  vestibule. 

"Oh!  That's  kind  of  you,"  said  he,  his  pleasure  gaining 
strength.  "I  'm  happy  to  say  that  there  is,  —  the  best  news. 
He's  going  to  get  well." 

"I  'm  so  glad  to  hear  it,"  replied  Miss  Heth 

If,  in  despite  of  herself,  there  was  a  trace  of  stiff  self-conscious 
ness  in  her  voice  and  air,  how  was  she  to  be  blamed  for  that? 
There  is  a  breaking-point  for  even  the  most  "finished"  manner, 
and  the  sight  of  this  man  to-day  was  like  a  rough  hand  on  a  new 
wound.  A  great  wave  of  helplessness  had  broken  over  her,  as  the 
opening  door  revealed  his  face:  how  could  you  possibly  avoid  the 
unavoidable,  how  destroy  the  indestructible?  And  it  seemed 
that,  since  yesterday,  he  had  robbed  her  of  her  one  reliable 
weapon.  .  .  . 

The  tall  young  man  pushed  back  his  light  hair.  He  was  smil- 

180 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

ing.  The  mild  winter  sun  streamed  down  upon  him,  and  his  face 
looked  worn,  as  if  he  wanted  sleep. 

"We  had  a  consultation  this  morning  —  three  doctors,"  he 
went  on,  in  the  friendliest  way.  "They  're  sure  they  've  found 
out  where  the  trouble  is.  A  little  operation,  of  no  difficulty  at 
all — I  Ve  done  it  myself,  once  in  the  hospital!  —  and  he  '11  be 
walking  the  street  in  a  fortnight." 

"That  is  good  news,  indeed.  We  have  been  so  —  sorry  about 
his  illness." 

"Thank  you  —  it's  a  tremendous  relief  to  me,  of  course.  He 
seemed  so  very  ill  last  night.  .  .  ." 

Standing  under  his  eye  in  thetiledVestibule,  Carlisle  produced, 
from  her  swinging  gold  case,  not  her  card,  but  those  of  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  B.  Thornton  Heth,  and  extended  them  in  a  gloved  hand. 

" May  I  leave  these?  "  she  said,  with  the  reemergence  of  "man 
ner."  "My  mother  and  father  will  be  delighted  to  learn  that 
Mr.  Beirne  is  soon  to  be  well  again." 

"That's  very  kind.  I  know  my  uncle  would  be  — will  be  — 
much  gratified  by  your  interest  and  sympathy." 

Who  shall  know  the  heart  of  a  woman?  The  thing  was  done, 
the  inquiry  over.  The  most  punctilious  inquirer  could  have  bowed 
now,  and  walked  away  down  the  steps.  Cally  imperceptibly 
hesitated. 

She  had  four  times  met  this  man,  and  he  had  three  times  (at 
the  lowest  computation)  driven  her  from  his  presence.  That 
thought,  unsettling  in  its  way,  had  leapt  at  her  somewhere  in 
the  night:  she  had  sought  to  drape  it,  but  it  had  persisted  some 
what  stark.  And  now  had  not  he  himself  taught  her,  by  that  hate 
ful  apology  which  seemed  to  have  settled  nothing,  that  there 
were  subtler  requitals  than  by  buffets  upon  the  front?  .  .  . 

The  pause  was  psychological  purely,  well  covered  by  the  card- 
giving.  Words  rose  to  Cally's  tongue's  tip,  gracious  words  which 
would  show  in  the  neatest  way  how  unjust  were  this  man's  opin 
ions  of  her  and  her  family.  However,  the  adversary  spoke  first. 

"I  'm  so  glad  to — to  see  you  again,  Miss  Heth,"  he  began, 
with  a  loss  of  ease,  twirling  the  B.  Thornton  Heth  cards  be 
tween  long  thin  fingers —  "to  have  the  opportunity  to  say  .  .  . 

181 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

That  is  —  perhaps  you  '11  let  me  say  —  you  must  n't  think  the 
Works  are  so —  so  disappointing  as  perhaps. they  may  seem,  just 
at  first  sight.  You  know  — " 

Her  flushing  cheeks  stopped  him  abruptly;  and  she  had  not 
usually  found  him  easy  to  stop. 

"But  I  didn't  think  they  were  disappointing  at  all!    Not 
in  the  least!" 
*  The  young  man's  eyes  fell. 

"Oh!"  he  said,  with  noticeable  embarrassment.  "I  —  only 
thought  that  possibly — as  you  —  you  had  not  happened  to  be 
in  the  factory  district  for  —  for  some  time,  —  that  possibly  you 
might  be  just  a  little  surprised  that  things  weren't  —  well, 
prettier.  You  know,  business  — " 

"  But  I  was  n't  surprised  at  all,  I  've  said !  I  knew  exactly  what 
it  was  like,  of  course.  Just  exactly.  And  I  consider  the  Works  — 
very  pretty  ...  for  a  factory."  I 

She  gazed  up  at  him  indignantly  from  beneath  a  little  mush 
room  hat  lined  with  pink,  challenging  him  to  contradict  her  by 
look  or  word.  But  he  swallowed  her  dare  without  a  quiver.  .  .  . 
Good  heavens,  what  girl  worth  her  salt  would  endure  apologies 
on  behalf  of  her  own  father,  from  one  so  much,  much  worse 
than  a  stranger  to  her?  It  may  be  that  V.  Vivian  liked  the  lovely 
Hun  the  better  for  that  lie. 

"Well,"  he  said,  compounding  the  felony  with  a  gallant  gulp, 
"I  —  I  'm  glad  you  were  n't  disappointed  — " 

She  could  certainly  have  retired  upon  that  with  all  the  honors, 
but  the  fact  was  that  the  thought  of  doing  so  did  not  at  the 
moment  cross  her  mind.  She  found  the  conversation  interesting 
to  a  somewhat  perilous  degree. 

"I  suppose  your  idea  is,"  she  said,  and  it  showed  her  courage 
that  she  could  say  it,  "that  a  factory  ought  to  be  a  —  a  sort  of 
marble  palace!" 

"No.  Oh,  no.  No  —  " 

"But  it  is  your  idea,  is  it  not,  that  it's  my  father's  duty  to 
take  his  money  and  build  a  perfectly  gorgeous  new  factory,  full 
of  all  sorts  of  comforts  and  luxuries  for  his  work-girls?  That  is 
your  idea  of  his  duty  to  the  poor,  is  it  not?  .  .  ." 

182 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

There  it  was,  the  true  call :  what  ear  could  fail  to  catch  it?  Out 
they  came  running  from  the  city  again,  the  old  scribes  with  new 
faces;  pouring  and  tumbling  into  the  wilderness  to  ask  a  lashing 
from  the  grim  voice  there.  .  .  .  Only,  to-day,  it  must  have  been 
that  he  did  not  hear  their  clamors.  Surely  there  was  no  abhor 
rence  in  these  eager  young  eyes.  .  .  . 

"Well  —  personally,  I  don't  think  of  any  of  those  things  just 
as  a  —  a  duty  to  the  poor  —  exactly." 

"Oh!  You  mean  it's  his  duty  to  himself,  or  something  of  that 
sort?  That  sounds  like  the  catechism.  .  .  .  That  is  what  you 
meant,  is  it  not?  " 

"Well,  I  only  meant  that  —  I  think  we  might  all  be  hap 
pier—if  ..." 

An  uproar  punctuated  the  strange  sentence.  Mr.  Beirne's  but 
ler  had  chosen  to-day  to  take  in  coal,  it  seemed;  a  great  wagon 
discharged  with  violence  at  precisely  this  moment.  Two  shovel- 
ers  fell  to  work,  and  an  old  negro  who  was  washing  the  basement 
windows  at  the  house  next  door,  the  Carmichaels',  desisted  from 
his  labors  and  strolled  out  to  watch.  It  was  the  most  interest 
ing  thing  happening  on  the  block  at  the  moment,  and  of  course 
he  wanted  to  see  it. 

Carlisle  stared  at  Mr.  Beirne's  nephew,  caught  by  his  word. 

"Oh!  .  .  ."  said  she.  "So  you  think  my  father  would  be  much 
happier  if  he  stripped  himself  and  his  family  to  provide  Turkish 
baths  and  —  and  Turkish  rooms  for  his  work-girls?  I  must  say 
I  don't  understand  that  kind  of  happiness.  But  then  I'm  not  a 
Socialist!" 

She  said  Socialist  as  she  might  have  said  imp  of  darkness.  How 
ever,  the  young  man  seemed  unaware  of  her  bitter  taunt.  He 
leaned  the  hand  which  did  not  hold  the  cards  against  a  pilaster 
in  the  vestibule-side,  and  spoke  with  hurried  eagerness: 

"I  don't  mean  that  exactly,  and  I  —  I  really  don't  mean  to 
apply  anything  to  your  father,  of  course.  I  only  mean  —  to  — 
to  speak  quite  impersonally  —  that  it  seems  to  me  the  reason 
we  all  follow  money  so  hard,  and  hold  to  it  so  when  we  have  it, 
is  that  we  believe  all  along  it 's  going  to  bring  us  happiness,  and 
that  .  .  .  After  all  —  is  n't  it  rather  hard  ever  to  get  happiness 

183 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

that  way?  Perhaps  we  might  find  that  the  real  way  to  be  happy 
was  just  in  the  other  direction.  That  was  all  I  meant.  .  .  .  Don't 
you  think,  really,"  the  queer  man  hurried  on,  as  if  fearing  an 
interruption,  "it  stands  to  reason  it's  not  possible  to  be  happy 
through  money?  It 's  so  segregating,  it  seems  to  me  —  it  must 
be  that  way.  And  is  n't  that  really  just  what  we  all  want  it  for? 
—  to  make  a  —  a  sort  of  little  class  to  ourselves,  to  wall  our 
selves  off  from  the  rest  —  from  what  seems  to  be  —  life.  It  ele 
vates  in  a  sense,  of  course  —  but  don't  you  think  it  often  elevates 
to  a  —  a  sort  of  rocky  little  island?  " 

They  seemed  to  be  personal  words,  in  despite  of  his  exordium, 
and  V,  Vivian  boggled  a  little  over  the  last  of  them,  doubtless 
perceiving  that  he  was  yielding  fast  to  his  old  enemy  (as  indi 
cated  to  O'Neill)  and  once  more  being  too  severe  with  these 
people,  who  after  all  had  never  had  a  chance.  .  .  . 

Cally  looked  briefly  away,  up  the  sunny  street.  She  raised  a 
white-gloved  hand  and  touched  her  gay  hair,  which  showed  that, 
though  she  hesitated,  she  was  perfectly  at  ease.  She  had  just 
been  struck  with  that  look  suggestive  of  something  like  sadness 
upon  the  man's  face,  which  she  had  noticed  that  night  in  the 
summer-house.  She  herself  was  inclined  to  connect  this  look 
with  his  religiosity,  associating  religion,  as  she  did,  exclusively 
with  the  sad  things  of  life.  Or  did  it  come  somehow  from  the 
contrast  between  his  shabby  exterior  and  that  rather  shining 
look  of  his,  his  hopefulness  incurable?  .  .  . 

She  replied,  in  her  modulated  and  fashionable  voice:  "I  don't 
agree  with  you  at  all.  I  'm  afraid  your  ideas  are  too  extraordin 
ary" —  she  pronounced  it  extrord'n'ry,  after  Mr.  Canning  — 
"for  me  to  follow.  But  before  I  go — "  > 

"They  do  seem  extraordinary,  I  know,"  broke  from  him,  as  if 
he  could  not  bear  to  leave  the  subject —  "but  at  least  they're 
not  original,  you  know.  ...  I  think  that  must  be  just  the  mean 
ing  of  the  parable  of  the  rich  young  man.  —  Don't  you,  your 
self?" 

"The  parable  of  the  rich  young  man?" 

She  looked  at  him  with  dead  blankness.  Passers-by  hopped 
over  the  coal-hole  and  glanced  up  at  the  pair  standing  engrossed 

184 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


upon  the  doorstep.  Such  as  knew  either  of  them  concluded  from 
their  air  that  Mr.  Beirne  was  worse  again  this  morning. 

V.  Vivian's  gaze  faltered  and  fell. 

"Just  a  —  a  little  sort  of  story,"  he  said,  nervously  —  "you 
might  call  it  a  little  sort  of  —  allegory,  illustrating  —  in  a  way 
—  how  money  tends  to  —  to  cut  a  man  off  from  his  fellows.  .  .  . 
This  man,  in  the  sort  of  — of  story,  was  told  to  give  away  all  he 
had,  not  so  much  to  help  the  poor,  so  it  seems  to  me,  as  to  — " 

"I  see.  And  of  course,"  she  said,  vexed  anew  —  how  did  she 
seem  always  to  be  put  at  a  disadvantage  by  this  man,  she,  who 
could  put  down  a  Canning,  alas,  only  too  easily  and  well?  —  "of 
course  that's  just  what  you  would  do?" 

"What  I  should  do?" 

"If  .you  had  a  lot  of  money,  of  course  you  would  give  it  all 
away  at  once,  for  fear  you  might  be  cut  off  —  segregated  — 
rocky  island  —  and  so  forth?  " 

To  her  surprise,  he  laughed  in  quite  a  natural  way.  "  Uncle 
Armistead,  who  's  usually  right,  says  I  'd  hang  on  to  every  cent 
I  could  get,  and  turn  away  sorrowful.  .  .  .  Probably  the  only 
reason  I  talk  this  way  is  I  have  n't  got  any.  .  .  .  That  is — ex 
cept  just  a  —  a  little  income  I  have,  to  live  on.  .  .  ." 

No  doubt  he  said  this  hypocritically,  self-righteous  beneath  his 
meekness,  but  Cally  was  prompt  to  pounce  on  it  as  a  damning 
confession.  She  flashed  a  brilliant  smile  upon  him,  saying,  "Ah, 
yes !  —  it 's  so  much  easier  to  preach  than  to  practice,  is  n't 
it?" 

And  quite  pleased  with  that,  she  proceeded  to  that  despoiling 
of  him  she  had  had  in  mind  from  the  beginning: 

"  Before  I  go,  I  started  to  tell  you  just  now,  when  you  inter 
rupted  me,  that  I  was  in  rather  a  hurry  yesterday,  and  did  n't 
have  time  to  —  to  say  to  you  what  I  meant  to  say,  to  answer  your 
request — " 

"Oh!"  said  he,  rather  long  drawn-out;  and  she  saw  his  smile 
fade.  "Yes?" 

"I  meant  to  say  to  you,"  she  went  on,  with  the  same  "great 
lady"  graciousness,  "that  I  shall  of  course  speak  to  my  father 
about  the  girl  you  say  was  unjustly  dismissed.  It's  a  matter, 

185 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


naturally,  with  which  you  have  nothing  to  do.  But  if  an  injus 
tice  has  been  done  by  one  of  his  subordinates,  my  father  would 
naturally  wish  to  know  of  it,  so  that  he  may  set  it  right." 

The  little  speech  came  off  smoothly  enough,  having  been  pre 
pared  (on  the  chance)  last  night.  For  the  moment  its  effect 
seemed  most  gratifying.  The  young  man  turned  away  from  her, 
plainly  discomfited.  There  was  a  small  callosity  on  the  pilaster 
adjacent  to  his  hand,  and  he  scratched  at  it  intently  with  a 
long  forefinger.  Standing  so,  he  murmured,  in  the  way  he  had  of 
seeming  to  be  talking  to  himself: 

"I  knew  you  would  ...  I  knew!" 

She  disliked  the  reply,  which  seemed  cowardly  somehow,  and 
said  with  dignity:  "It 's  purely  a  business  matter,  and  of  course  I 
make  no  promises  about  it  at  all.  If  there  has  been  any  injus 
tice,  it  was  of  course  done  without  my  father's  knowledge.  I 
have  no  idea  what  he  will  do  about  it,  but  whatever  he  decides 
will  of  course  be  right." 

The  man  turned  back  to  her,  hardly  as  if  he  had  heard. 

"The  trouble  is,"  he  said,  in  an  odd  voice,  harder  than  she  had 
supposed  him  to  possess,  "I  did  n't  trust  you.  I  — " 

"  Really  that 's  of  no  consequence.  I  'm  not  concerned  in  it 
at—" 

"I  was  sure  all  the  time  you  would  —  be  willing  to  do  it,"  he 
went  on,  in  the  same  troubled  way.  "I  was  sure.  And  yet  last 
night  I  went  off  and  spoke  to  somebody  else  about  it  —  a  man 
who  has  influence  with  MacQueen  —  John  Farley  —  a  —  a  sort 
of  saloonkeeper.  Corinne  is  back  at  work  this  morning." 

The  girl  struggled  against  an  absurd  sense  of  defeat.  She  wished 
now  —  oh,  how  she  wished!  —  that  she  had  gone  away  immedi 
ately  after  giving  him  mamma's  and  papa's  cards.  .  .  . 

"Oh!"  she  said,  quite  flatly "Well  — in  that  case  — there 

is  no  more  to  be  said." 

But  there  he  seemed  to  differ  with  her.  "I'd  give  a  good 
deal,"  he  said  slowly,  "if  I'd  only  waited.  .  .  .  Could  you  let  me 
say  how  sorry  I  am  — " 

"  Please  don't  apologize  to  me !  I  've  told  you  before  that  I  — 
I  detest  apologies.  ..." 

186 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"I  was  not  apologizing  to  you  exactly,"  said  V.  Vivian,  with 
a  kind  of  little  falter. 

"I — have  n't  anything  to  do  with  it,  I  Ve  said !  It 's  all  purely 
a  business  matter  —  purely! "  And  because,  being  a  woman,  she 
had  been  interested  in  the  personal  side  of  all  this  from  the 
beginning,  she  could  not  forbear  adding,  with  indignation:  "I 
can't  imagine  why  you  ever  thought  of  coming  to  me,  in  the  first 
place." 

"  Why  I  ever  thought  of  it?  "  he  repeated,  looking  down  at  her 
as  much  as  to  ask  whom  on  earth  should  he  come  to  then. 

"If  you  had  a  complaint  to  make,  why  did  n't  you  go  direct  to 
my  father?" 

"Ah,  but  I  don't  know  your  father,  you  see." 

"Oh!  ...  And  you  consider  that  you  do  know  me?" 

The  man's  right  hand,  which  rested  upon  the  pilaster,  seemed 
to  shake  a  little. 

"Well,"  he  said,  hesitatingly,  "we've  been  through  some 
trouble  together.  ..." 

Then  was  heard  the  loud  scraping  of  shovels,  and  the  merry 
cackle  of  the  old  negro,  happy  because  others  toiled  in  the  glad 
morning,  while  he  did  not.  Cally  Heth's  white  glove  rested  on 
Mr.  Beirne's  polished  balustrade,  and  her  piquant  lashes  fell. 

She  desired  to  go  away  now,  but  she  could  not  go,  on  any  such 
remark  as  that.  Staying,  she  desired  to  contradict  what  the  alien 
had  said,  but  she  could  not  do  that  either.  The  complete 
truth  of  his  remark  had  come  upon  her,  indeed,  with  a  sudden 
shock.  This  man  did  know  her.  They  had  been  through  trouble 
together.  Only,  it  seemed,  you  never  really  got  through  trouble 
in  this  world:  it  always  bobbed  up  again,  waiting  for  you,  which 
ever  way  you  turned.  .  .  . 

And  what  did  this  lame  stranger  have  to  do  with  her,  that,  of 
all  people  on  earth,  his  eyes  alone  had  twice  seen  into  her 
heart?  .  .  . 

She  looked  suddenly  up  at  him  from  under  the  engaging  little 
hat,  and  said  with  a  smile  that  was  meant  to  be  quite  easy  and 
derisive,  but  hardly  managed  to  be  that: 

"  Supposing  that  you  do  know  me,  as  you  say,  and  that  I  came 

187 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

to  you  to  prescribe  for  me  —  as  a  sort  of  happiness  doctor  .  .  . 
Would  you  say  that  to  give  away  everything  I  had  —  or  papa 
had  —  would  be  the  one  way  for  me  to  be  —  happy?" 

"Happy?  .  .  ." 

He  curled  and  recurled  the  corners  of  the  Heth  cards,  which 
did  not  improve  their  appearance.  He  gazed  down  at  the  work  of 
his  hands,  and  there  seemed  to  be  no  color  in  his  face. 

"To  be  happy  .  .  .  Oh,  no,  I  should  n't  think  that  you  —  that 
any  one  —  could  be  happy  just  through  an  act,  like  that." 

"I  could  hardly  give  away  more  than  everything  all  of  us  had, 
could  I?" 

"Well,  but  don't  you  think  of  happiness  as  a  frame  of  mind, 
a  —  a  sort  of  habit  of  the  spirit?  Don't  you  think  it  comes  usually 
as  a — a  by-product  of  other  things?  " 

"Oh,  but  I'm  asking  you,  you  see.  .  .  .  What  sort  of  things  do 
you  mean?" 

He  hesitated  perceptibly,  seeming  to  take  her  light  derisive 
remarks  with  a  strange  seriousness. 

"Well,  I  think  a  —  a  good  rule  is  to  ...  to  cultivate  the  sym 
pathies  all  the  time,  and  keep  doing  something  useful." 

Carlisle  continued  to  look  at  his  downcast  face,  with  the  trans 
lucent  eyes,  and  as  she  looked,  the  strangest  thought  shimmered 
through  her,  with  a  turning  of  the  heart  new  in  her  experience. 
She  thought:  "This  man  is  a  good  friend.  .  .  ." 

And  then  she  said  aloud,  suddenly:  "I  am  not  happy —  very." 

She  could  not  well  have  regarded  that  as  a  Parthian  shot,  a 
demolishing  rebuke.  Nevertheless,  she  turned  upon  it,  precipi 
tately,  and  went  away  down  the  steps. 

These  events  took  place,  in  the  course  of  ten  minutes  upon  a 
doorstep,  on  the  3ist  of  January.  On  the  2yth  of  February,  Car 
lisle  departed,  from  the  face  of  her  mother's  displeasure  and  all 
the  horridness  of  home,  for  her  Lenten  visit  to  the  Willings. 
Through  the  interval  the  dreariness  of  life  continued;  Canning 
was  reported  in  Cuba;  she  had  abandoned  all  thought  of  a  little 
note.  The  nephew  she  saw  no  more;  but  it  chanced  that  she 
came  to  hear  his  name  on  many  lips.  For  on  the  cold  morning 

188 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

of  the  birthday  of  the  Father  of  his  Country,  old  Armistead 
Beirne,  whom  three  doctors  had  pronounced  all  but  a  well  man, 
was  found  dead  in  his  bed:  and  a  few  days  later,  by  the  probation 
of  his  will,  it  became  known  that  of  his  fortune  of  some  two  hun 
dred  thousand  dollars,  he  had  left  one-fifth  to  his  eccentric 
nephew  in  the  Dabney  House. 


XV 

In  which  she  goes  to  New  York,  and  is  very  Happy  indeed. 

MRS.  WILLING  was  twenty-four,  handsome,  expensive, 
lively,  and  intensely  fond  of  what  she  thought  was 
pleasure.  Willing  was  thirty-two,  and  had  a  close-clipped 
mustache:  there  were  ten  thousand  men  in  New  York  whom  you 
might  have  mistaken  for  him  at  twenty  paces.  He  was  assist 
ant  something  on  a  nineteenth  story  downtown,  and  his  scale 
of  living  continually  crowded  his  income  to  the  wall.  The  Will- 
ings  —  there  were,  of  course,  but  two  of  them  —  had  the  kind 
of  home  which  farmers'  daughters  so  envy  the  heroines  of  "so 
ciety"  novels.  They  lived  in  a  showy  apartment  hotel  in  the 
West  Fifties,  kept  a  motor-car,  and  went  out  for  dinner.  In  fact 
"out"  was  the  favorite  word  in  the  establishment:  the  Willings 
did  everything  but  sleep  "out." 

"I  can't  bear  to  stick  at  home,"  said  Mrs.  Willing  to  Carlisle. 
"I've  always  loved  to  go  places." 

And  places  they  went  from  one  end  of  Carlisle's  visit  to  the 
other.  The  shops  in  the  morning,  downtown  on  a  rush  to  lunch 
with  Willing,  back  to  Broadway  for  a  matinee,  back  home  at  the 
double-quick  to  dress  for  dinner,  to  the  theatre  after  dinner,  to 
supper  after  the  theatre.  There  was  always  hurry;  there  was  never 
quite  time  to  reach  any  of  the  places  at  the  hour  agreed. 

"That's  the  fun!"  said  Florrie  Willing.  "Rush,  rush,  rush 
from  morning  to  night.  That 's  little  old  New  York  in  a  nut 
shell." 

Carlisle  had  expected  to  be  thoroughly  diverted  by  the  rattle, 
bang,  and  glitter  in  which  the  Willings  lived,  but  in  this  she  was 
only  partially  gratified.  Pure  restlessness,  it  seemed,  had  entered 
her  blood:  she  was  no  sooner  fairly  settled  in  the  Wrexham  than 
she  began  to  wish  herself  back  home  again.  The  vague  thought 
pursued  her,  even  at  the  places,  that  she  was  missing  something; 

190 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


that  she  had  stepped  aside  from,  not  into,  the  real  current  of  her 
life.  Dazzling  indeed  were  some  of  the  dining-places  to  which  the 
experienced  Willings  took  their  guest,  but  somehow  none  of  them 
seemed  so  really  interesting,  after  all,  as  home.  What  was  hap 
pening  away  off  there  on  Washington  Street?  Suppose  Mr. 
Canning  should  return  ahead  of  time  for  his  farewell  visit  — 
return  and  find  her  not  there?  .  .  . 

"You're  changed  somehow,  Cally,"  cried  Florrie  Willing,  on 
the  third  or  fourth  day  —  "I  can't  just  put  my  little  patty  on  it, 
but  I  can  see  it  all  the  same." 

They  had  just  rushed  up  from  breakfast,  which  the  Willings 
took  in  the  apartment  cafe,  and  were  now  dressing  furiously  to  go 
shopping.  Cally,  surprised  with  her  mouth  full  of  hatpins,  said 
of  course  she  had;  she  was  getting  frightfully  old. 

"You  never  used  to  rest  a  cheek  on  a  pensive  hand,  and  stare 
five  minutes  at  a  time  into  eternity.  Out  with  it!"  said  Florrie. 
"You're  disappointed  in  love." 

"That's  it,  too.  I  loved  a  tall  pretty  soldier,  and  he  rode 
away." 

" We  'II  never  ride  away,  at  this  rate.  Get  a  move  on,  Cally! 
We  've  slews  and  slews  of  places  to  go  to." 

Cally,  who  considered  that  she  already  had  a  move  on,  did 
her  best  to  get  on  another  one. 

Young  Mrs.  Willing  added:  "Whatever  became  of  the  gay 
young  thing  with  the  eyelashes  you  flirted  so  outrageously  with, 
the  time  we  were  up  at  Island  Inn?  What  was  his  name  —  oh  — 
Mr.  Dalhousie?" 

Carlisle  winced  a  little  in  spite  of  herself.  .  .  .  Banquo  could 
not  have  been  more  impossible  to  forget  than  this. 

"Oh  —  why,  he  and  I  had  the  worst  kind  of  smash-up  —  and 
he  went  away  somewhere.  I  never  like  to  think  of  him  any 
more Let's  fly!" 

Fly  they  did,  that  morning  and  many  others.  It  was  all  very 
different  from  life  at  home.  Born  and  bred  in  a  town  where 
social  life  is  large,  constant,  and  gay,  Carlisle  could  not  help 
being  struck  by  the  fact  that  the  Willings,  roughly  speaking, 
had  no  friends.  One  other  young  couple  in  the  same  hotel,  the 

191 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


Jennisons,  appeared  to  be  about  the  limit  of  their  intimate 
circle:  a  phenomenon,  no  doubt  at  least  partly  explained  by  the 
fact  that  the  Willings  moved  every  year,  or  sometimes  twice  a 
year,  "to  get  a  change."  Thus,  in  the  huge  rabbit-warren,  they 
were  constantly  cutting  themselves  off  from  their  past. 

"I  can't  endure  to  poke  about  in  the  same  little  spot  year  after 
year,"  said  Florrie  Willing.  "If  I  don't  have  something  new,  I 
simply  froth  at  the  mouth  and  die." 

However,  Mr.  Willing  of  course  had  his  connections  downtown, 
and  knowing  his  duty  in  the  premises,  he  would  frequently 
"bring  up"  men  in  the  evening,  brisk,  lively,  ambitious  young 
fellows  like  himself.  One  of  the  men  so  brought  up  fell  abruptly 
and  deeply  in  love  with  Carlisle,  which  helped  considerably  to 
pass  the  time  away. 

"You'd  better  hold  on  to  Pierce,"  said  Florrie,  talking  seri 
ously  as  a  married  woman :  "  He 's  one  of  the  coming  men  —  dead 
certain  to  make  a  pile  of  money  some  day." 

Cally  said  she  'd  dearly  love  to  hold  on  to  Pierce,  but  to  her 
self  she  smiled,  thinking  if  Florrie  only  knew.  By  this  time  she 
had  been  a  fortnight  in  New  York,  and  had  decided  to  leave  at 
the  end  of  another  week.  Whatever  else  the  visit  was  or  was  not, 
it  had  more  than  justified  itself  by  providing  her  with  just  the 
perspective  she  needed,  to  see  things  once  again  in  their  true 
proportions.  Distance  seemed  wonderfully  to  soften  away  all 
the  horridnesses.  Nothing  had  really  happened.  On  the  con 
trary,  against  this  stimulating  background  it  was  reassuringly 
plain  that  everything  was  agreeably  settled  at  last,  or  very  soon 
to  be  so  settled.  More  and  more,  as  April  drew  steadily  nearer, 
Mr.  Canning  towered  shiningly  in  the  foreground  of  her  thought. 

The  days  passed  quickly  enough.  She  and  Florrie  spent  many 
absorbing  mornings  in  the  shops,  Carlisle  for  the  most  part  "just 
looking,"  under  the  coldly  disapproving  eyes  of  the  shop-ladies. 
But  her  intentions  were  serious  at  bottom,  in  view  of  three  hun 
dred  dollars  which  papa  had  privately  given  her,  at  the  last 
moment,  companied  by  a  defiant  wink.  (The  wink  indicated  col 
lusion  against  mamma,  whose  design  it  had  been  to  cut  her  daugh 
ter  off  penniless  for  the  trip.)  After  a  great  deal  of  looking,  for 

192 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

she  was  a  thrifty  buyer,  Cally  expended  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  dollars  for  a  perfectly  lovely  two-colored  dress,  bewitchingly 
draped,  and  seventy-five  dollars  for  a  little  silk  suit.  Both  were 
iirt  cheap,  Florrie  agreed.  She  looked  four  times  at  a  dear  of  a 
hat  going  begging  for  seventy  dollars,  but  with  only  three  hun 
dred  you  have  to  draw  the  line  somewhere,  so  Cally  simply 
purchased  a  plain  gray  motor-coat  lined  with  gray  corduroy, 
which  she  really  needed,  at  sixty  dollars.  She  also  sought  a  gift 
for  papa,  in  recognition  of  his  liberality,  and  finally  selected  a 
silver  penknife  as  just  the  thing.  The  knife,  luckily  enough, 
could  be  got  for  only  $2.50. 

The  young  broker  who  had  fallen  in  love  with  Carlisle  came  up 
four  times  with  Willing,  called  five  times  in  between,  and  became 
host  at  two  of  the  "out"  evenings  for  the  party  of  four.  Carlisle 
forbore  to  give  him  any  encouragement,  though  she  rather  liked 
his  eyes,  and  the  way  his  mouth  slanted  up  at  the  right  corner. 

"I'm  wild  about  you,"  said  he,  on  her  last  evening,  —  his 
name,  if  it  is  of  the  smallest  interest,  was  Pierce  Watkins,  Jr.,  — 
"I'll  shoot  myself  on  your  doorstep  to-morrow  if  it'll  give  you 
even  a  moment  of  pleasure." 

Carlisle  assured  him  that  she  desired  no  suicidal  attentions. 

"You're  the  loveliest  thing  I  ever  looked  at,"  said  he,  huskily. 
"  God  bless  you  for  that,  anyway.  And  no  matter  what  else  hap 
pens  to  me,  I  '11  love  you  till  I  die." 

"Don't  look  so  glum,  Mr.  Watkins  dear,"  said  Cally. 

They  did  not  go  to  any  matinee  on  the  last  afternoon,  the  rea 
son  being  that  it  was  Monday  and  there  were  n't  any,  except  the 
vaudevilles,  which  were  voted  tiresome.  Florrie  and  Carlisle 
lunched  quietly  at  "home";  had  a  rubber  of  bridge  afterwards  in 
the  apartment  of  Edith  Jennison  (who  produced  for  the  neces 
sary  fourth  an  acquaintance  she  had  made  last  week  in  the  tea 
room  of  the  Waldorf-Astoria);  and  rushed  from  the  table  for 
hats,  veils,  and  a  drive  on  the  Avenue. 

Carlisle  was  to  leave  at  ten  o'clock.  Her  trunks  were  packed; 
her  "reservations"  lay  in  the  heavy  gold  bag  swinging  from  her 
side.  Home,  somehow,  beckoned  to  her  as  it  had  never  done 
before.  Besides,  New  York,  with  its  swarming  population  (mostly 

193 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

with  palms  up)  and  its  ceaseless  quadruple  lines  of  motor-cars, 
began  to  oppress  her. 

"It's  too  full  of  people,"  she  laughed  to  Mrs.  Willing  as  they 
shot  down  in  the  lift.  "It's  too  big.  Some  day  it  will  swell  up 
and  burst." 

"Why,  that's  the  fun  of  it,  rusticus!  How  I  love  the 
roar!"  ' 

"  I  like  it,  too,"  said  Carlisle.  "But  I  do  think  it's  nice  to  live 
in  a  city  where  you  can  -sometimes  cross  Main  Street  without  ask 
ing  four  policemen,  and  then  probably  having  your  leg  picked 
off,  after  all." 

They  dashed  across  the  onyx  lobby  for  the  main  entrance,  as 
fast  as  they  could  go,  Mrs.  Willing  remarking  that  they  were 
almost  too  late  to  catch  the  crowds  as  it  was.  From  the  small 
blue- velvet  parlor,  across  the  corridor  from  the  clerk's  desk,  a 
tall  man  rose  at  the  sight  of  them,  and  came  straight  forward. 
For  a  moment  Carlisle's  heart  stopped  beating  as  she  saw  that 
it  was  Hugo  Canning. 

He  advanced  with  his  eyes  upon  her,  brought  her  to  a  halt 
before  him.  If  the  imps  of  memory  must  have  their  little  toll  at 
this  remeeting,  the  flicker  passed  through  her  too  quickly  for 
her  to  take  note  of  it.  It  woke  no  palest  ghost  of  rebellion,  to 
walk  now.  The  girl's  heart,  having  missed  a  beat,  ran  away  in  a 
wild  flutter.  .  .  . 

"Did  my  cards  reach  you?"  said  the  remembered  voice,  with 
out  preface.  "They  just  went  up,  I  believe.  But  I  see  you  mean 
to  go  out." 

He  looked  a  little  pale  under  the  lobby's  brilliant  lights,  but 
never  had  he  seemed  so  handsome  and  impressive.  Carlisle 
looked  up  and  looked  down,  and  the  sight  of  him  there  was  an 
exaltation  and  heavenly  fulfilment  and  a  garland  upon  her  brow. 

"We  must  have  passed  them  as  we  came  down,"  said  she. 
"How  do  you  do?  I  had  no  idea  you  were  in  this  part  of  the 
world." 

He  said  that  he  was  just  off  the  train.  She  presented  him  to 
Mrs.  Willing,  who  hardly  repressed  a  start  as  she  heard  and  iden 
tified  his  name. 

194 


V.     V.'s     Eyes 

"  Will  you  come  with  us  for  a  little  drive?  "  said  Carlisle.  "  We 
were  just  starting  out  to  take  the  air.  Or  .  .  ." 

Florrie  Willing  looked  intensely  eager.  Canning  hesitated. 
The  feminine  intuitions,  of  which  we  have  heard  so  much,  natur 
ally  divined  the  cause  of  his  hesitation,  and  Florrie  rushed  into 
the  breach. 

"You're  excused  from  our  engagement,  Cally!"  said  she,  with 
archness,  and  some  nobility,  too.  "I  know  Mr.  Canning  does  n't 
care  to  parade  the  Avenue  in  our  last  year's  model.  You  shall 
have  the  city  to  yourselves.  Why  not  go  up  to  the  apart 
ment?" 

Carlisle  glanced  at  Canning,  who  said:  "You  are  very  nice  and 
kind,  Mrs.  Willing."  Mrs.  Willing  looked  at  him  as  much  as  to 
say,  "I  can  be  five  times  as  nice  as  that,  if  you  only  knew.  .  .  ." 

When  she  had  rushed  off,  Canning  said:  "Do  you  feel  like  a 
little  walk?" 

"Oh,  how  nice!"  said  Carlisle. 

"Let's  stroll  up  to  the  Plaza  and  have  tea." 

They  went  out,  turned  east  and  came  into  the  Avenue,  where, 
the  afternoon  being  fine,  one  million  people  were  methodically 
stepping  on  each  other's  heels.  However,  these  were  people 
without  existence,  even  when  they  jostled  into  one. 

The  moment  they  were  out  of  earshot  of  the  listening  clerk, 
Canning  said,  looking  straight  in  front  of  him: 

"Have  n't  you  missed  me  at  all,  Carlisle?" 

"Oh,  yes!  I  seem  to  have  done  hardly  anything  else." 

"I've  been  learning  your  name,  you  see,"  said  Canning, 
after  five  steps  in  silence.  "You  won't  mind?  .  .  .  Miss  Heth 
would  be  a  sham,  after  thinking  nothing  but  Carlisle  all  these 
weeks." 

She  said  that  she  did  n't  mind.  His  presence  here  beside  her 
seemed  to  fill  every  reach  and  need  of  her  being:  here  was  what 
her  soul  had  cried  for,  through  all  the  empty  days.  It  did  not 
seem  that  she  could  ever  mind  anything  any  more.  .  .  . 

"I'm  very  lucky  to  see  you,"  she  went  on,  quite  naturally, 
"for  I'm  going  back  home  to-night.  Your  six  months'  sentence 
is  n't  quite  up  yet,  is  it?  Is  it  business  that  brings  you?" 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"What  do  you  call  business?  Of  course  I've  come,"  said  he, 
"only  to  see  you." 

He  went  on,  after  a  glorious  pause:  "And  this  is  the  second 
time  —  or  is  it  the  fourth  or  fifth?  Did  you  happen  to  hear  of  me 
at  Eva  Payne's  in  January?" 

"Oh,  yes!   Only  not  till  four  hours  after  you  were  gone." 

"You'd  hardly  guess,  though,  how  I've  been  torn  between 
my  —  wish,  and  what  it  pleases  me  to  call  my  pride.  ...  I  was 
in  Florida  and  going  on  to  Cuba  for  February,  at  least,  by 
special  request  of  Heber.  I  thought  I  should  like  to  see  you  again 
before  I  got  so  far  away.  Only  when  I  came  in  sight  of  your  door 
once  more,  I  could  n't  bring  myself  to  knock.  ..." 

One  interesting  coincidence  about  the  reasoning  of  beautiful 
ladies  is  that  it  is  sometimes  right.  Continuing  as  they  swung  up 
the  crowded  street,  Canning  said: 

"It  seemed  to  me  that  .  .  .  However,  that's  no  matter  now. 
Unfortunately  I  've  the  devil's  own  temper.  To  be  packed  off 
so,  and  then  to  surrender  without  a  condition  —  I  needed  more 
weeks  of  silent  self-communion  for  that.  I've  had  them  now, 
under  pretty  skies  where  the  moon  shines  bright  o'  nights.  I 
believe  the  breezes  have  blown  my  humors  away.  I'm  happy 
to  be  here  with  you,  Carlisle." 

"I  like  it,  too.  .  .  .  How  on  earth  did  you  ever  find  me?" 

"Kerr's  been  writing  me  notes  from  time  to  time,  you  know. 
In  one  of  them  he  mentioned  that  you  were  away  from  home.  I 
wired  him  yesterday  from  Tampa  for  your  address." 

"Dear  Willie!"  said  Carlisle.  "Do  you  know  I'm  mad  to  be 
at  home  again?" 

They  came  to  the  shining  hotel,  and  passed  into  the  tea-room, 
which  was  now  rapidly  filling  up.  The  doorman  greeted  Mr. 
Canning  by  name.  An  obsequious  majordomo  wafted  him  and 
his  lady,  with  smiles,  to  the  little  table  of  his  choice.  Many  eyes 
were  drawn  to  the  young  pair.  He  was  a  man  to  be  noticed  in 
any  company,  but  in  presence  and  in  air  she  was  his  not  unworthy 
mate.  He  himself  became  aware,  even  then,  perhaps  more  than 
ever  then,  that  this  provincial  girl  stood  transplanting  to  a  metro 
politan  setting  with  unimpaired  distinction.  .  .  . 

196 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"And  tea-cakes,  ma'am?"  implored  the  loving  waiter. 

"Muffins,"  said  Canning,  and  abolished  him  by  a  movement 
of  his  little  finger. 

Carlisle  would  have  preferred  the  tea-cakes,  but  she  loved 
Hugo's  lordly  airs. 

He  dropped  his  gloves  into  a  chair,  and  there  descended  upon 
him  a  winning  embarrassment. 

"  Tell  me  now,  for  my  sins  and  my  penitence,"  he  said  in  a  low 
voice,  his  strong  fingers  clasping  a  spoon,  "that  you  have  blotted 
away  what  is  past." 

She  said  that  she  had  blotted  it  all  away. 

He  went  on,  with  considerable  loss  of  ease:  "I  suppose  the  ac 
cursed  dilettante  habit  has  got  into  my  blood.  I  needed  these 
unhappy  days  and  nights,  for  my  soul's  good  — " 

"Oh,  please!"  said  Carlisle,  her  eyes  falling  from  his  grave 
face.  "Let's  not  talk  of  it  any  more." 

He  stopped,  as  if  glad  to  leave  the  subject;  but  after  a  silence 
he  added  with  entire  continuity: 

"Your  spirit's  very  fine.  ...  It's  what  I've  always  admired 
most  in  women,  and  found  least  often." 

The  loving  waiter  set  tea  and  muffins.  Peace  unfolded  white 
wings  over  the  little  table.  A  divine  orchestra  played  a  dreamy 
waltz  that  had  reference  to  a  beautiful  lady.  Carlisle  poured, 
and  remembered  from  Willie's  apartment  that  Canning  liked  one 
lump  and  neither  cream  nor  lemon.  He  seemed  absurdly  pleased 
by  the  small  fact.  The  topic  of  the  Past  having  been  finally  dis 
posed  of,  the  man's  ordinary  manner  seemed  abruptly  to  leave 
him.  His  gaze  became  oddly  unsettled,  but  he  perpetually  re 
turned  it  to  Carlisle's  face.  He  appeared  enormously  interested 
in  everything  that  she  said  and  did,  yet  a  t  the  same  time  errat 
ically  distrait  and  engrossed.  He  became  more  and  more  grave, 
but  simultaneously  he  gave  evidences  of  a  considerable  nervous 
excitement  within.  .  .  . 

If  Carlisle  noticed  these  eccentricities  at  all,  she  could  have 
had  no  difficulty  in  diagnosing  them,  having  observed  them  in 
the  demeanor  of  young  men  before  now.  The  case  was  otherwise 
with  Canning,  to  whom  his  own  unsteadinesses  were  a  continuing 

197 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

amazement.  Heart-whole  he  had  reached  his  thirtieth  year,  and 
his  present  enterprise  had  furnished  him  with  the  surprise  of 
his  life.  He  was,  indeed,  a  man  who  had  lately  looked  upon  a 
miracle.  He  had  watched  three  humiliating  rebuffs  turn  under  his 
eye,  as  it  were,  to  so  many  powerful  lodestones.  He  himself 
hardly  understood  it,  but  it  was  a  truth  that  no  degree  of  cunning 
on  the  part  of  this  girl  could  have  so  captured  his  imagination 
as  her  spirited  independence  of  him  (in  mamma's  vocabulary, 
her  flare-up).  A  man  who  held  himself  naturally  high,  he  had 
been  irresistibly  magnetized  by  her  repulses  of  him.  Rebuffed, 
he  had  sworn  to  go  near  her  no  more,  and  had  turned  again,  an 
astonishment  to  himself,  and  tamely  rung  her  bell.  .  .  . 

Canning  looked  and  looked  at  Carlisle  across  the  little  table, 
and  it  was  as  if  more  miracles  went  on  within  him.  Not  inex 
perienced  with  the  snarers,  he  had  learned  wariness;  and  now,  by 
some  white  magic,  wariness  seemed  not  worth  bothering  for. 
If  marriage  was  to  come  in  question,  his  dispassionate  judgment 
could  name  women  clearly  more  suitable;  but  now  dispassionate 
ness  was  a  professor's  mean  thumb-rule,  too  far  below  to  con 
sider.  Of  a  sudden,  as  he  watched  her  loveliness,  all  his  instincts 
clamored  that  here  and  now  was  his  worthy  bride :  one,  too,  still 
perilously  not  broken  to  his  bit.  But  .  .  .  Was  it,  after  all,  possi 
ble?  Was  it  conceivable  that  this  unknown  small-capitalist's 
daughter,  rated  so  carelessly  only  the  other  day,  was  the  des 
tined  partner  of  his  high  estate?  .  .  . 

"I  can't  bear  to  think  of  your  going  to-night,"  he  exclaimed 
suddenly,  with  almost  boyish  eagerness.  "  You  know  this  town 
is  home  to  me.  I  can't  explain  how  perfect  it  seems  to  be 
here  with  you." 

She  mentioned  demurely  her  hope  of  his  return  to  the  Payne 
Fort  in  a  month  or  so:  a  remark  which  he  seemed  to  find  quite 
unworthy  of  notice. 

"  Stay  over  till  to-morrow,  Carlisle !  Let 's  do  that !  And  we  '11 
take  the  day  train  down  together." 

"Goodness!  With  my  tickets  all  bought?  And  my  trunks 
packed  since  morning? 

Canning  glanced  hurriedly  at  his  watch.  "I  can  arrange  about 

198 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

the  tickets  in  three  minutes.  As  for  the  trunks,  Mrs.  Willing's 
maid  will  be  only  too  glad  to  unpack  them  for  you.  Do  —  do 
stay." 

She  laughed  at  his  eagerness,  though  at  it  her  heart  seemed  to 
swell  a  little. 

"And  if  they  've  already  gone  to  the  station?" 

"I  can  put  my  hand  on  ten  men  who  will  drive  like  the  devil 
to  bring  them  back." 

"And  if  my  mother  confidently  expects  me  for  breakfast  to 
morrow?  " 

"I  will  write  the  telegram  to  her  myself."  He  added:  "Ah, 
you  can't  refuse  me!" 

Cally  said:  "I'm  afraid  you  are  one  of  the  terrible  masterful 
men  that  we  read  about,  Mr.  Canning.  But  —  perhaps  that's 
why  I  shall  be  glad  to  stay." 

He  thanked  her  with  some  unsteadiness,  and  said:  "Where 
shall  we  dine?  .  .  .  And  we  could  be  excused  from  dressing, 
could  n't  we?  I  can't  bear  to  lose  sight  of  you,  even  for  an  hour." 

Of  course  he  had  his  way  there,  too.  In  adjoining  booths  they 
did  their  telephoning,  he  to  somebody  or  other  about  the  reserv 
ations,  she  to  leave  a  message  for  Florrie  Willing.  Later  they 
dined  in  a  glittering  refectory,  just  opened,  but  already  of  great 
renown.  .  .  . 

It  was  an  unforgettable  meal.  So  long  as  she  lived,  this  evening 
remained  one  of  the  clearest  pictures  in  Carlisle's  gallery  of 
memorabilia.  Before  the  dinner  was  half  over,  Canning's  im 
mediate  intentions  became  apparent  to  her.  Doubts  and  hesi 
tancies,  if  he  had  had  any,  appeared  to  recede  abruptly  from  his 
horizon.  With  the  serving  of  dessert,  the  words  were  spoken. 
Canning  asked  Carlisle  to  be  his  wife.  He  did  it  after  an  endear 
ingly  confused  preamble,  which  involved  his  family  and  his 
natural  pride  in  upholding  and  continuing  the  traditions  of  his 
house.  Critically  speaking,  his  remarks  might  have  been  con 
sidered  too  long  and  too  much  concerned  with  the  Cannings; 
but  of  the  genuineness  of  his  love,  Carlisle  could  not  entertain  a 
doubt.  As  she  and  mamma  had  planned  it,  so  it  had  fallen  out. 

IQQ 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


She  accepted  Hugo  with  her  eyes  while  an  affectionate  servitor 
offered  her  some  toasted  biscuit.  She  accepted  the  biscuit,  too. 
It  was  later  agreed  that  the  betrothal  should  not  be  announced 
for  the  present,  except  to  the  parents  of  the  contracting  parties. 
Canning  had  argued  strongly  for  a  day  in  June,  but  Carlisle  at 
length  carried  her  point  that  the  interval  was  quite  too  short. 
It  was  now  the  2oth  of  March.  The  final  decision,  reached  on  the 
train  next  day,  was  that  Canning  should  join  Mrs.  and  Miss  Heth 
abroad,  in  June  or  July,  and  the  formal  announcement  of  the 
coming  alliance  should  be  made  then,  from  London  or  Paris. 
The  wedding  itself  would  take  place  early  in  October. 


XVI 

Of  Happiness  continuing,  and  what  all  the  World  loves;  revealing, 
however,  that  not  Every  Girl  can  do  what  the  French  People  once 
did. 

THE  row  of  maiden's  testimonials  had  received  their 
crowning  complement.  The  beginning  at  the  Beach 
had  touched  its  shining  end.  As  she  and  mamma  had 
planned  it,  so  it  had  magically  fallen  out. 

When  Mrs.  Heth  heard  the  tidings  (which  she  did  within  three 
minutes  of  Carlisle's  arrival  at  home)  the  good  lady  hardly 
restrained  the  tears  of  jubilee.  Having  all  but  abandoned  hope, 
she  was  swept  off  her  feet  by  the  overwhelming  revulsion  of  feel 
ing,  and  her  attitude  —  for  of  course  mamma  always  produced 
an  attitude  about  everything  upon  the  spot  —  was  not  merely 
ecstatic,  but  tender  and  magnanimously  humble.  For  it  was 
clear  now  that  the  daughter  had  outpointed  the  mother  at  the 
Great  Game;  Cally  had  justified  her  flare-up;  and  Mrs.  Heth, 
with  eyes  nobly  moist,  begged  forgiveness  for  all  the  hibernal 
harshnesses. 

"You  must  make  allowances  for  the  natural  anxieties  of  a 
loving  mother's  heart,"  said  she,  in  the  first  transports.  .  .  . 
"You've  done  me  so  proud,  dear  little  daughter.  Proud!  .  .  . 
How  Society  will  open  its  eyes!  ..." 

"  So  he  is  coming  to  dinner  with  us ! "  she  added  a  moment  later, 
exulting  with  her  eyes.  "He  will  speak  to  your  father  then.  .  .  . 
It 's  not  too  late  to  add  a  course  or  two.  And  we  must  have  out 
the  gold  coffee-set.  .  .  ." 

Canning  dined  in  state  at  the  House  that  night,  with  coffee 
from  the  gold  set.  Next  evening,  there  were  similar  ceremonies. 
Accompanying  Carlisle  homeward  on  the  day  following  their  re- 
meeting,  Canning  had  meant  to  return  at  once  to  New  York;  for 
his  long  furlough  had  now  run  out,  and  he  had  felt  a  man's  call 

201 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


of  duty  upon  him.  Moreover,  it  was  already  arranged  that  he 
should  come  again  for  a  real  betrothal  visit,  sometime  before  the 
first  of  May.  Yet  he  lingered  on  for  four  days  now,  a  man  mag 
netized  beyond  his  own  control.  Radiant  days  were  these. 

In  view  of  Carlisle's  desire  that  her  news  should  not  tamely 
leak  out,  depriving  the  Announcement  of  its  due  eclat,  some  little 
discretion  was  of  course  necessary  at  this  period:  else  people 
would  talk  and  say  afterwards  that  they  knew  it  all  along.  She 
saw  that  she  must  still  make  engagements  which  did  not  include 
her  betrothed;  she  must  meet  the  archnesses  of  her  little  world 
with  blank  looks  above  the  music  in  her  heart,  with  many  eva 
sions,  and  even,  perhaps,  a  harmless  fib  or  two.  Nevertheless, 
the  lovers  secured  many  hours  all  to  themselves.  Shut  from 
public  view  in  Mr.  Heth's  study,  and  more  especially  in  long 
motor  rides  down  unfrequented  by-lanes  they  were  deep  in  the 
absorptions  of  exploring  each  other,  of  revealing  themselves  each 
to  each.  And  to  Carlisle  these  hours,  marked  upon  their  faces 
with  the  first  fresh  wonder  of  her  conquest,  were  dazzling  be 
yond  description. 

Spring  was  coming  early  this  year,  slipping  in  on  light  bright 
feet.  And  in  the  House  of  Heth  there  was  felt  a  vernal  exuber 
ance,  indeed:  permeating  papa  even,  extending  to  the  very  serv 
ants.  Mr.  Heth  had  received  the  news  of  the  great  event  with 
profound  satisfaction,  asserting  unequivocally  that  Canning  was 
the  finest  young  man  he  had  ever  seen.  And  yet,  unlike  mamma, 
his  joy  was  tempered  with  a  certain  genuine  emotion  at  the  pro 
spect  of  so  soon  losing  the  apple  of  his  eye. 

"You  know  the  old  rhyme,  Cally,"  said  he,  pinching  her  little 
ear  —  "'Your  son's  your  son  all  his  life,  but  your  daughter's 
your  daughter  till  she  becomes  a  wife.'  .  .  .  Don't  let  it  be  that 
way,  my  dear.  You're  all  the  son  your  old  father's  got.  .  .  ." 

As  to  mamma,  her  feet  remained  in  the  clouds,  but  her  head 
grew  increasingly  practical.  She  had  been  rather  opposed  to  post 
poning  the  announcement,  being  ever  one  for  the  bird  in  the 
hand;  but  she  had  yielded  with  good  grace,  and  within  the  hour 
was  efficiently  planning  the  "biggest"  wedding,  and  the  cost 
liest  wedding-reception,  ever  given  in  that  town.  By  the  second 

202 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


day  she  was  giving  intelligent  thought  to  the  trousseau  —  every 
stitch  should  be  bought  in  Paris,  except  a  few  of  the  plainer 
things,  in  New  York  —  and  had  finally  decided  that  the  refresh 
ments  at  the  reception  should  be  "by  Sherry."  People  should 
remember  that  reception  so  long  as  they  all  did  live. 

"All  the  Canning  connection  shall  come,"  she  cried,  —  "rely 
on  me  to  get  them  here,  —  and  all  the  most  fashionable  and 
exclusive  people  in  the  State.  Every  last  one  of  them,"  said  she, 
"except  Mary  Page." 

After  an  interval,  during  which  she  sat  with  a  glitter  in  her  eye, 
she  added  explosively: 

"/'«  show  her  whether  I'm  probable!" 

The  remark,  it  seemed,  had  rankled  even  in  the  moment  of 
supreme  victory.  .  .  . 

Spring,  too,  it  became,  the  quintessence  of  spring,  in  the  young 
maiden's  heart.  Nature  but  symbolized  the  brilliant  new  life 
henceforward  to  be  her  own.  And  the  more  she  came  to  discern 
her  lover  against  his  background  of  wealth,  place,  and  power,  the 
more  she  saw  how  brilliant  that  life  was  to  be,  the  more  she  thrilled 
with  the  magnitude  of  her  own  accomplishment.  Of  himself  in 
their  new  relation,  Canning  talked  much  in  these  days,  and  with 
an  unaffected  earnestness:  of  the  high  nature  of  the  career  they 
would  make  together;  of  his  own  honors  and  large  responsibili 
ties  to  come;  in  chief  of  his  family,  whose  name  it  would  be  their 
pride  to  uphold  through  the  years  ahead.  And  the  girl's  heart 
warmed  as  she  listened.  What  was  all  the  storied  dignity  of  the 
Cannings  now  but  so  much  sweet  myrrh  and  frankincense  upon 
her  own  girlish  altar?  .  .  . 

He  was  her  maiden's  ideal.  He  was  her  prince  from  a  story 
book,  come  true.  If  any  flaw  were  conceivable  in  so  complete  a 
fulfilment,  it  might  have  been  imagined  only  in  this  very  fact  of 
Hugo's  all-perfectness.  Marrying  upward,  in  the  nature  of  the 
case,  involved  a  large  material  one-sidedness :  that  was  the  ob 
ject  and  the  glory  of  it  all.  Yet  now,  in  her  romantic  situation, 
there  woke  new  emotions  in  Cally  Heth,  and  she  dimly  perceived 
that  her  lifelong  ambition  carried,  through  its  very  advantages, 
a  subtle  disadvantage  to  the  heart.  Unsuspected  tendernesses 

203 


V.    V.'s     E 


yes 


seemed  to  stir  within  her,  and  she  was  aware  of  the  vague  wish 
to  bestow  upon  her  lover,  to  make  him  a  full  gift  for  a  gift. 
However,  it  was  clear  that  Canning  had  everything.  For  the 
priceless  boons  he  was  to  confer  upon  her,  she  saw  that  she  had 
nothing  to  give  him  in  return,  except  herself. 

With  this  return,  Canning,  for  his  part,  seemed  amply  content. 
When  the  hour  came  when,  for  his  manhood,  he  must  report 
himself  again  to  that  office  in  New  York  which  had  not  known  his 
face  since  October,  he  took  the  parting  hard.  He  was  to  return 
again  before  April  was  out,  for  a  fortnight's  stay  preceding  his 
betrothed's  departure  for  Europe;  yet  he  seemed  hardly  able  to 
tear  himself  away.  .  .  . 

"I  hope  we  shall  have  a  long  life  together,"  said  he,  a  bright 
gleam  in  his  handsome  eyes,  "but  it's  certain,  my  own  dear, 
that  we'll  never  be  engaged  but  once.  ..." 

Moved  herself  by  the  farewells,  she  teasingly  reminded  him  of 
his  one-time  impatience  to  fly  back  to  lights  and  home.  But 
Canning,  straining  her  to  his  heart,  replied  that  home  was  where 
the  heart  is,  and  was  admitted  to  have  the  best  of  the  argument. 

Carlisle's  world  had  been  knocked  far  out  of  its  ordered  orbit. 
Hugo  Canning,  possessed  by  her,  was  so  towering  a  fact  that  it 
threw  the  whole  horizon  into  a  new  perspective.  Between  this 
shining  state  and  the  winter  of  discontent,  there  was  no  imag 
inable  connection.  Cause  and  effect  must  turn  a  new  page,  life's 
continuity  start  afresh. 

So  it  seemed,  in  love's  first  bloom.  And  yet,  circumstances 
being  as  they  were,  it  was  hardly  possible  that  Carlisle  should 
at  one  stroke  completely  cut  herself  off  from  the  past,  as  Florrie 
Willing  constantly  did,  as  the  French  people  once  did,  by  means 
of  their  well-known  Revolution. 

In  Hugo's  absence  (full  as  the  days  were  with  questions  of  the 
trousseau,  rendered  doubly  exciting  by  mamma's  princely  atti 
tude  toward  expense),  Carlisle  began  to  recognize  once  more  the 
landmarks  of  her  former  environment.  Doubtless  a  certain  period 
of  emotional  reaction  was  inevitable,  and  with  it  the  reassocia- 
tion  of  ideas  began.  Canning  was  away  a  solid  month.  One  day 

204 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


soon  after  his  return,  —  it  was  on  a  lovely  afternoon  in  early 
May,  as  they  were  motoring  homeward  after  four  hours'  delight 
ful  tete-a-tete  in  Canning's  own  car,  —  Carlisle  said  to  him : 

"Oh,  Hugo,  what  do  you  think  I  did  while  you  were  away? 
Subscribed  a  hundred  dollars  to  a  Settlement  House!  My  own 
money,  too,  —  not  papa's  at  all!" 

Hugo,  whose  intensity  of  interest  in  his  betrothed  seemed  only 
to  have  increased  during  the  days  of  absence,  cried  out  at  her 
munificence. 

" So,  you 've  money,  in  those  terms  —  well ! "  said  he.  "Are  n't 
you  mortally  afraid  of  being  gobbled  up  by  a  fortune-hunter 
some  fine  day?" 

"A  great  many  people  have  warned  me  about  that  —  men 
tioning  you  specially,  by  the  way.  But  I've  always  told  them 
that  you  loved  me  for  my  fair  face  alone." 

Canning  made  a  lover's  remark,  a  thoroughly  satisfactory  one. 

"But  don't  you  see,"  he  added,  "this  business  of  your  having 
money  changes  everything.  I  must  double  my  working  hours, 
I  suppose !  I  'm  too  proud  a  man  to  be  dependent  on  my  wealthy 
wife  for  support." 

"I'm  glad  to  know  you  may  be  prosperous,  too,  some  day, 
Hugo,"  said  she;  and,  after  a  little  more  frivolous  talk:  "Did  I 
mention  that  I  'm  soliciting  subscriptions  from  visiting  men  for 
that  Settlement  I  spoke  of?" 

"  Great  heavens!"  cried  Canning,  amused.  "Why,  don't  you 
think  a  Hundred  Dollars  is  more  than  sufficient  —  for  one  little 
family?" 

"They  wouldn't  say  so,"  said  Carlisle,  laughing  and  coloring  a 
little,  "for  they're  asking  for  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  and 
have  raised  about  two  so  far.  What  could  be  more  pitiful  than 
that?" 

Canning,  who  was  driving  his  car  to-day,  as  he  occasionally 
liked  to  do,  then  asked,  why  was  a  Settlement?  And  as  well  as 
she  could  Carlisle  retailed  her  rather  sketchy  information:  how 
"  they  "  planned  to  buy  the  deserted  Dabney  House,  make  it 
the  headquarters  for  all  the  organized  charities  of  the  city, 
and  use  the  rest  of  the  great  pile  for  working-men's  clubs. 

205 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

night  classes,  lodgings,  gymnasiums  and  so  forth.  Thanks  to 
the  influence  of  Rev.  Mr.  Dayne,  Mrs.  Heth  had  been  induced 
to  lend  her  name  as  a  member  of  the  Settlement  Association's 
organization  committee.  But  it  was  from  her  cousin  Henrietta 
Cooney  that  Carlisle  had  got  most  of  her  facts,  at  a  recent 
coming-to-supper  while  Hugo  was  away. 

Canning,  listening,  was  glancing  about  him.  Having  made 
an  adventurous  run  to-day  by  way  of  the  old  Spring  Tavern,  — 
he  had  plotted  it  out  himself,  with  maps  and  blue-books,  —  they 
had  reentered  the  city  by  the  back  door  as  it  were,  and  now  spun 
over  unaccustomed  streets. 

"I  did  n't  know  you  went  in  for  charity,  my  dear." 

"Oh,  a  cousin  of  mine  is  drumming  up  funds  for  this,  you 
see " 

Not  clearly  understanding  it  herself,  how  could  she  explain 
the  impulse  which  had  led  her  to  offer  Hen,  without  being  dunned 
at  all,  her  royal  subscription?  Perhaps  she  had  a  vague  feeling 
that  this  would  prove,  to  the  complete  satisfaction  of  the  public, 
that  she  and  her  family  were  far  from  being  shameless  homicides, 
dead  to  all  benevolent  works.  It  appeared  that  mamma  had 
already  subscribed  fifteen  dollars  to  the  Settlement,  on  personal 
solicitation  of  Mr.  Dayne,  but  of  course  you  could  not  prove  any 
thing  much  for  fifteen  dollars. 

Hugo,  having  turned  to  look  at  Carlisle,  lost  interest  in  Settle 
ments.  His  gaze  became  fixed,  and  it  said,  plainer  than  ardent 
print,  that,  if  he  had  many  possessions,  here  was  far  the  best 
and  dearest  of  them.  .  .  . 

"Where  's  that  ripping  little  hat  you  wore  yesterday?  You 
know  —  a  brown  one,  sort  of  a  toque,  I  suppose  —  all  old  rose 
inside?" 

"Why,  Hugo!  .  .  .  Don't  you  like  this  hat  extremely  ?" 

"Rather!  Only,  if  there  is  a  choice,  I  do  think  I'd  vote  for  the 
toque.  .  .  .  You  've  gone"and  spoiled  me  by  giving  away  how  you 
can  look  when  you  try." 

Carlisle  laughed  merrily.  She  was  glad  to  have  her  lover  so 
observant  of  what  she  wore,  even  though  he  did  not  know  nearly 
so  much  about  clothes  as  he  imagined. 

206 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"It's  not  a  toque  at  all,"  said  she,  "but  I'll  wear  it  for  you  to 
morrow,  provided  you  promise- me  now  to  run  away  from  that 
tiresome  secretary  and  come  to  lunch." 

"Done!  At  one- thirty  o'clock." 

"That's  the  exact  luncheon  hour,  as  it  happens,  but  I  notice 
that  many  of  the  best  fiances  make  it  a  practice  to  report  for  duty 
at  least  half  an  hour  before  the  gong.  It  looks  so  much  better." 

"Running  and  eating's  no  better  than  eating  and  running,  you 
allege.  There's  some  small  merit  in  the  contention.  .  .  .  What 
of  those  sterling  fiances  who  punch  the  time-clock  a  full  hour 
before  the  whistle?" 

"Oh,  dear  me,  Hugo,  are  there  any  like  that?" 

"There  's  but  one  now  in  captivity,  I  believe.  I  —  Hello!  .  .  . 
Missed  him,  by  Jove!" 

"What  was  it?  A  cat?" 

"Didn't  you  see?  Our  old  hoodoo  —  that  camp-meeting 
chap!..." 

"Oh!" 

"I  wonder  what  ill  wind  he's  blowing  this  time.  .  .  .  Poetic 
justice  if  I'd  knocked  him  into  the  middle  of  next  week." 

Carlisle  had  involuntarily  looked  back,  struck  with  a  sense  of 
coincidence,  and  also  with  the  odd  feeling  of  having  received  a 
douche  of  cold  water.  They  were,  it  seemed,  rolling  along  through 
old  South  Street,  and  behind  her,  sure  enough,  she  saw  the  loom 
ing  shape  of  the  ancient  hotel,  which  the  Settlement  Association 
could  have  for  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  cash.  Of  the  "  camp- 
meeting  chap,"  however,  she  saw  nothing:  presumably,  having 
evaded  justice,  he  had  already  disappeared  into  his  lair.  Never 
theless  she  was  effectually  reminded  that  this  man  was  still  in 
the  world. 

"Is  this  where  the  fellow  lives?"  said  Canning,  also  glancing 
back  down  the  dingy  street.  "I  thought  somebody  said  he'd 
come  into  money  from  his  lamented  uncle." 

She  confirmed  the  conjecture,  and  Hugo  then  observed: 

"Well,  I'll  give  him  a  month  to  discover  that  it 's  his  duty  to 
God  to  remove  to  a  more  fashionable  neighborhood." 

"Oh!  Do  you  think  so?" 

207 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Have  you  ever  known  one  of  these  smooth  religious  fellows 
who  was  n't  keen  after  the  fleshpots  when  his  chance  came?" 

Carlisle  laughed  and  said  she  had  n't,  having  indeed  known  few 
religious  fellows  of  any  kind  in  her  young  life.  But  she  was  struck 
with  this  new  proof  of  Hugo's  essential  congeniality  with  her. 
His  penetrating  comment,  born,  it  seemed,  of  that  curious  anti 
pathy  which  she  had  noticed  before,  fell  in  astonishingly  with 
trends  of  her  own. 

Many  weeks  had  passed  since  Carlisle  had  decided  to  oust 
this  religious  fellow  definitely  from  her  thoughts,  as  belonging  so 
clearly  to  that  past  upon  which  she  had  now  turned  a  victorious 
back.  And  in  these  expulsive  processes,  she  had  found  herself 
greatly  assisted  by  the  young  man's  confession  of  hypocrisy,  as 
she  regarded  it,  on  this  very  subject  of  giving  away  money.  Per 
haps  this  had  seemed  a  frail  club  once;  she  herself  had  hardly  put 
much  strength  in  it  in  the  beginning;  but  she  had  been  resolute, 
and  time  had  strengthened  her  convincingly,  according  to  her 
need.  For  if  the  man  was  a  whited  sepulchre,  full  of  dead  men's 
bones  within,  then  clearly  his  opinions  of  people  and  their  families 
were  not  of  the  slightest  importance  to  anybody,  so  what  was  the 
good  of  anybody's  thinking  of  them?  .  .  . 

Not  to  let  the  conversation  lag,  she  had  remarked,  with  no 
pause  at  all: 

"It's  strange  our  nearly  running  over  him,  just  then  and  there. 
That  old  shack  is  the  Dabney  House,  and  you  know  it 's  he  who 
got  up  the  Settlement  idea." 

"No,  I  did  n't  know  it,"  said  Canning,  slowing  down  to  take  a 
corner  which  led  on  to  civilization.  "Still,"  he  added,  "I  shan't 
let  that  stay  my  generosity.  I  resolved  three  blocks  back  to  sub 
scribe  five  hundred  —  just  to  throw  you  in  the  shade  —  and  I 
will  not  be  deterred." 

Having  been  duly  applauded  for  his  prodigality,  he  inquired: 
"How  much,  by  the  way,  is  the  good  doctor  donating  out  of  his 
forty  thousand?" 

"Not  a  cent!"  said  Carlisle,  who  had  questioned  Hen  on  this 
very  point. 

It  was  thus,  indeed,  that  circumstances  had  given  demolishing 

208 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


weight  to  her  club.  "If  I  had  money  I'd  probably  hang  on  to 
every  cent,"  the  man  had  said,  that  winter  morning  on  his  uncle's 
doorstep;  and  now  he  had  money,  a  lot  of  it,  and  hanging  on 
he  undoubtedly  was.  Hen  herself  had  confessed  it,  with  a  cer 
tain  defiance,  trying  to  create  the  impression  that  the  man  was 
merely  reserving  his  funds  for  some  other  good  purpose.  .  .  . 

The  triumphant  ring  in  Carlisle's  voice  might  have  struck  Can 
ning  as  odd,  if  he  had  happened  to  notice  it.  Still  more  obscure, 
however,  were  the  inner  processes  which  led  him  to  say: 

"Does  he  make  any  charge  for  the  thought?  .  .  .  Well,  it's  a 
fine  thought,  all  the  same;  a  fine  work.  On  reconsideration  I 
raise  my  subscription  to  a  thousand.  Hang  the  expense!  .  .  ." 

There  was  another  gay  burst  of  felicitation,  after  which  Car 
lisle  became  somewhat  silent.  Canning,  bowling  proficiently  up 
Washingtoi^Street,  spoke  of  his  honored  maternal  grandmother, 
the  great  lady  Mrs.  Theodore  Spencer,  and  her  famous  Brookline 
home.  Beside  him,  Carlisle,  listening  with  one  ear  only,  considered 
the  strangeness  of  life.  Transfigured  within,  she  had  seemed  to 
look  out  upon  a  new  universe,  yet  was  not  this  somehow  the 
face  of  an  old  familiar,  slyly  peeping?  Of  what  use,  then,  were 
clubs?  When  were  things  ever  settled,  if  she  could  be  conscious 
of  a  little  cloud  no  larger  than  a  man's  hand  even  now,  with  the 
living  guarantee  of  her  omnipotence  at  her  side?  .  .  . 

"Who  was  that?"  said  Canning,  suspending  conversation  to 
bow,  with  Carlisle,  to  a  passing  female  pedestrian. 

"Oh,"  she  laughed,  a  little  vexedly,  roused  from  her  medita 
tions  —  "just  one  of  my  poor  relations." 

"Ah?"  said  he,  a  trifle  surprised. 

A  far  cry,  indeed,  from  the  celebrated  dowager,  friend  of  dip 
lomats  and  presidents,  to  Miss  Cooney  of  Saltman's  bookstore, 
in  a  three-year-old  skirt.  And  how  like  Hen,  instead  of  quietly 
looking  the  other  way,  to  yell  out  some  Cooneyesque  greeting 
and  wave  that  perfectly  absurd  umbrella.  .  .  . 

To  Hen  it  was,  a  day  or  two  later,  that  Carlisle  mailed  the  two 
Settlement  checks,  hers  for  a  hundred  and  Hugo's  for  ten  times 
that  amount.  She  licked  the  stamp  with  intense  satisfaction. 
However,  the  rewards  of  her  generosity  seemed  somewhat  flat. 

209 


V.    V.  's  '  E  y  e  s 


Hen,  indeed,  called  her  up  immediately  upon  receipt  of  her  com 
munication,  and  contents  noted,  with  excited  thanksgiving. 
However,  that  was  all :  the  checks  were  turned  over  to  Mr.  Dayne, 
and  there  the  matter  ended.  Carlisle  was  oppressed  with  a  sense 
of  anti-climax.  She  even  thought  of  sending  another  and  larger 
check  straight  to  Dr.  Vivian. 

Canning,  it  developed  rather  to  Carlisle's  surprise,  took  his 
business  quite  seriously.  His  indolences  of  the  sick-leave  period 
were  now  sloughed  from  him.  He  had  returned  this  time,  not 
merely  with  his  favorite  car  and  mechanic  for  the  afternoon  ex 
cursions,  but  accompanied  by  mysterious  "papers"  and  a  man 
stenographer;  and,  occupying  rooms  in  the  New  Arlington  Hotel, 
gave  his  mornings  and  even  some  of  his  evenings  religiously  to 
work.  • 

"Why,  Hugo,  are  you  a  lawyer?"  cried  Carlisle,  when  he  first 
explained  these  matters  to  her. 

"I  am,  and  a  pretty  keen  one,"  said  he. 

"And  do  you  know  how  to  reorganize  banks?" 

"I  can  reorganize  'em  like  the  devil,"  said  Hugo  sincerely;  for 
if  a  man  does  not  want  a  woman  to  boast  a  little  before  now  and 
then,  he  does  not  want  her  at  all.  .  .  . 

His  papers  and  his  telegrams,  his  periods  of  engrossment  in 
business  and  telephone-calls  from  his  secretary,  seemed  to  invest 
him  with  a  certain  new  dignity.  A  subtle  change  in  his  manner  was 
now  perceptible.  It  was  as  if  he  had  moulted  some  of  the  gay 
plumage  of  the  wooing-season,  and  unconsciously  begun  to 
gather  something  of  the  authority  of  the  coming  head  of  a  great 
house.  Like  many  men  who  have  long  enjoyed  but  eluded  the 
wiles  of  lovely  woman,  Canning  clearly  contemplated  the  mar 
ried  estate  with  profound  gravity.  In  his  absence  he  had  com 
municated  his  good  news  to  both  his  parents,  though  one  was 
in  Boston  and  the  other,  his  father,  in  Washington :  testifying,  in 
short,  before  a  Congressional  Investigation  Committee.  He  was 
not  especially  detailed  as  to  what  they  had  said,  beyond  their 
general  expressions  of  pleasure;  but  it  was  clear  that  he  regarded 
it  as  of  the  first  importance  that  they  should  be  pleased. 

210  * 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Matters  now,  indeed,  began  to  assume  a  distinctly  serious 
and  responsible  complexion.  The  days  of  purely  idyllic  romance 
seemed  to  slip  behind;  the  engagement  more  and  more  took 
shape  as  the  gateway  to  an  alliance  of  institutional  conse 
quence,  entailing  far-reaching  reactions  in  various  directions. 
Mamma's  remarks  made  it  plain  that,  with  Cally's  establish 
ment  as  Mrs.  Hugo  Canning,  her  own  career  of  brilliant  aspir 
ation  had  reached  its  final  goal.  Even  papa's  future  seemed  to 
be  affected  to  its  roots.  Already  he  spoke  with  satisfaction  of 
taking  a  smaller  house  next  year;  ultimately  of  "retiring"  to  an 
undefined  "little  place  in  the  country,"  toward  which  in  recent 
years  his  talk  had  slanted  somewhat  wistfully.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth  and  Carlisle  were  to  go  to  New  York  on  the  2oth  of 
May,  do  a  few  days'  preliminary  shopping  there,  and  sail  on  the 
26th.  Canning's  visit  lasted  till  near  the  middle  of  the  month, 
running  over  his  allotted  two  weeks.  And  deepening  intimacy 
only  brought  into  stronger  relief  his  great  advantages  of  position, 
antecedents,  and  experience;  only  showed  Carlisle  the  more 
clearly  how  distinguished,  cultivated,  and  superior  a  man  she 
had  won.  With  her  pride,  there  came  now,  it  seemed,  a  certain 
new  humility.  She  was  aware  that  never  in  the  days  of  the  thun 
dering  feet  had  she  been  so  desirous  of  pleasing  Hugo  as  now: 
when  he  was  no  shining  symbol  or  distant  parti,  but  the  exceed 
ingly  personal  and  living  man  who  was  so  soon  to  call  her  to  the 
purple.  She  caught  herself  at  times,  with  some  amused  surprise, 
in  the  deliberate  processes  —  editing  her  vocabulary,  manner,  and 
wardrobe,  for  example,  in  the  light  of  the  preferences  she  intu- 
itionally  read  in  his  eye.  So,  as  the  husbandly  dignity  descended 
upon  him,  she  found  herself  possessed  by  something  of  the  wifely 
duty.  . .  . 

Whenever  was  this  ticklish  business  of  the  dovetailing  of  two 
lives  accomplished  without  some  small  mutual  effort?  No  more 
could  be  said  than  that  Carlisle  felt,  in  rare  and  weak  moments,  a 
certain  sense  of  strain.  An  immaterial  subtlety  this,  properly  out 
of  the  range  of  mamma's  concrete  observations.  But  papa's 
heart  was  tender :  did  he  possibly  suspect  that  his  darling  might 
feel  herself  just  a  little  overshadowed  at  times? 

211 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

He  called  Cally  into  the  study  one  evening  before  dinner,  and 
with  a  mysterious  air  handed  over  to  her  a  bulky  packet  of 
very  legal-looking  papers. 

"Why,  papa!  What  is  it?" 

"Stock!"  answered  papa,  with  a  chuckle.  "Mostly  Fourth 
National.  There 's  a  little  more  than  fifty  thousand  dollars  there 
in  your  hand,  Cally." 

"But  —  why,  papa!  .  .  .  You  don't  mean  it  for  me!1' 

"A  little  weddin'  present  from  your  old  father.  I  meant  to  give 
it  to  you  next  fall,  and  then  I  thought,  why  wait?  Had  it  all  put 
in  your  name  to-day." 

11  Oh  — papa!  .  .  ." 

She  threw  her  arms  around  his  neck,  suddenly  and  oddly 
touched;  not  so  much  by  the  gift,  for  she  would  have  plenty 
of  money  soon,  as  by  this  evidence  of  her  father's  affectionate 
thought. 

"Your  daughter's  your  daughter  till  she  becomes  a  wife  ..." 
remarked  Mr.  Heth.  "It  won't  be  that  way,  will  it,  Cally,  eh?" 

"  Never  in  the  world.  .  .  .  Oh,  papa,  how  sweet  —  how  good  — 
you  are  to  me!  .  .  ." 

"You've  got  a  fine  man,"  said  papa,  presently,  patting  her 
cheek.  "But  my  judgment  is  it's  always  just  as  well  for  a  girl  to 
have  a  little  money  of  her  own.  Feels  independent.  You'll  have 
more  when  I'm  gone,  of  course.  That'll  give  you  a  little 
better 'n  three  thousand  a  year.  Non-taxable,  too." 

She  reported  her  new  wealth  to  Hugo,  quite  proudly,  within 
two  hours.  For  he  had  proved  willing  this  evening  to  purloin 
night  hours  from  his  grave  duties  as  attorney-at-law,  and  by 
telephone  had  easily  cajoled  Carlisle  into  breaking  an  engage 
ment  she  had  made  for  other  society.  In  the  nicest  sort  of  way, 
Canning  agreed  that  her  father  had  made  her  a  handsome 
dowry.  He  added,  holding  her  hand  tight,  that  she  was  to  let 
him  do  something  for  her,  too,  on  their  wedding  day.  Of 
course  she  must  have  her  own  money;  all  she  could  spend. 

"I  can  spend  lots,  my  dear.  You '11  find  me  a  frightfully  expen 
sive  young  person.  .  .  .  There  are  cigarettes  in  the  drawer, 
Hugo.  I  bought  the  kind  you  like,  this  time.  .  .  ." 

212 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

She  got  one  for  him,  struck  the  match  herself.  He  watched  her, 
loafing  lordly;  very  handsome  and  dear  he  looked  in  his  beautiful 
evening  clothes. 

And  thence,  in  the  lamplit  privacy  of  the  little  study,  —  Mr. 
Heth  having  fared  forth  to  a  Convention  "  banquet,"  •-  the 
talk  ranged  wide.  Late  in  the  evening,  it  returned  again  to  Car 
lisle,  as  the  possessor  of  large  independent  funds,  a  topic  of  pleas 
urable  possibilities  from  her  standpoint. 

She  said  idly:  "Do  you  believe  it  makes  you  happy  to  give 
away  money,  Hugo?  That's  a  rule  I  heard  somewhere." 

"  Unquestionably  one  of  the  most  refined  ways  known  of 
tickling  one's  little  vanity.  .  .  .  How  full  of  good  deeds  you  are 
these  days.  You're  thinking  of  the  poor  again,  I'm  right?" 

"I  must  have  been.  There's  nobody  else  who'd  take  money 
from  you,  is  there?" 

"Oh,  is  n't  there?  I  must  introduce  you  to  high  finance  some 
day." 

"Well,"  said  Carlisle,  "I  meant  just  to  give  it  away  —  to  any 
body  —  just  to  show  how  free  and  superior  you  are,  or  some 
thing.  .  .  .  Silly,  is  n't  it?  What's  your  happiness  rule,  Hugo?" 

He  replied  with  the  readiness  of  a  man  who  has  been  over  this 
path  long  ago: 

"To  have  the  capacity  to  want  things  very  much,  and  the 
ability  to  get  them." 

And  he  squeezed  the  little  hand  he  held,  as  if  to  say  that  he  had 
both  wanted  much  and  gotten  much. 

Carlisle  was  much  struck  with  this  rule,  which  she  now  saw  to 
have  been  her  own  and  mamma's  all  their  lives  long.  After  duly 
complimenting  Hugo  upon  it,  she  said: 

"Here's  another  one,  a  man  told  me  once:  'Cultivate  your 
sympathies  all  the  time,  and  do  something  useful.'" 

"That's  orthodox!  It  was  a  young  curate  with  a  lisp  who  told 
you,  I'll  wager." 

"Very  warm!"  she  laughed,  struck  again  by  his  astuteness. 
"It  was  your  hoodoo  —  Dr.  Vivian!  And,  oh,  now  that  I  think 
of  it,  he  gave  me  that  other  pointer,  too,  —  about  giving  away 
money." 

213 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


Hugo  replied:  "The  man  seems  to  be  dripping  with  wise  old 
saws,  in  a  thoroughly  inexpensive  sort  of  way.  .  .  .  Well,  we'll 
show  him  something  about  giving  away  money  some  day." 

He  was  silent  a  moment,  and  Carlisle  then  remembered  her 
thought  of  another  large  subscription  to  the  Settlement,  which 
she,  for  her  part,  could  easily  make  now  with  fifty  thousand 
dollars  all  her  own.  But  Canning  obliterated  all  such  reflections 
by  turning  and  taking  her  abruptly  in  his  arms. 

"This  is  what  I  want  to  make  me  happy.  Darling  —  dar 
ling!  .  .  ." 

They  sat  on  the  shabby  old  leather  lounge  which  papa  had 
held  fast  to,  by  winter  and  by  summer,  for  thirty  years.  Here 
they  had  sat  down  soon  after  eight  o'clock,  and  now  the  soft- 
toned  chimes  in  the  hall  had  just  sounded  eleven-thirty.  In  the 
first  days  of  their  engagement,  Carlisle  had  observed  that  Hugo 
was  "  very  demonstrative."  And  now,  at  the  end  of  their  loverly 
evening  together,  he  became  suddenly  and  strangely  moved,  pro 
fessing,  in  a  voice  unlike  his  own,  his  inability  to  live  longer 
without  her.  Then,  ignoring  all  their  elaborate  plannings,  he 
abruptly  begged  her  to  marry  him  in  June,  as  he  had  first  asked 
her 

"Why,  Hugo!"  she  said,  surprised  and  a  little  uncomfortable. 
"That's  so  much  dear  foolishness  —  and  not  a  stitch  of  clothes 
made  yet!  October's  just  around  the  corner.  ...  Do  sit  up, 
Hugo  dear.  There's  papa,  I  think." 

Hugo  sat  up.  Reason  reasserted  its  sway.  But  later,  Carlisle 
remembered  this  moment  with  a  dim  sense  of  trouble,  not  en 
tirely  new.  . . .  She  wondered  with  a  certain  disquiet  whether  all 
this  was  some  everlasting  difference  between  men  and  women, 
or  whether  she,  Carlisle,  was  by  nature  a  cold  and  undemon 
strative  sort  of  person?  Indeed,  there  did  seem  to  be  a  falling 
short  in  her  somehow;  for  if  not  with  herself  and  the  expressions 
of  her  love,  with  what  was  she  to  return  Hugo's  royal  gifts?  .  .  . 

There  were  three  more  days;  and  then  young  lovers  must  say 
farewell.  In  little  more  than  a  week  they  would  meet  again  in 
New  York;  but  still  this  seemed  a  real  parting  to  both.  It  was 
the  i3th  of  May,  the  day  which  marked  the  end  of  three  weeks 

214 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


of  cloudless  skies.  The  rain  long  predicted  by  the  weather  sharps 
had  come  in  the  night,  and  the  dreary  downpour  continued 
throughout  the  day.  Each  of  the  young  pair  seemed  somehow 
conscious  that  the  first  chapter  in  their  joint  story  had  reached 
an  end.  Better  days  they  might  certainly  have,  but  never  again 
days  just  like  these.  .  .  . 

"Keep  well,  dear  heart,"  begged  Canning  at  the  last,  "and 
take  care  of  all  your  loveliness  for  my  sake." 

Proud  of  her  beauty  he  ever  was,  and  especially  now  when  she 
was  so  soon  to  meet  his  mother  in  New  York.  And  at  the  final 
parting,  he  said,  visibly  moved: 

"Understand  me,  Carlisle,  you  are  mine  through  all  eternity. 
Whatever  happens  to  you  or  me,  this  is  a  love  that  shall  not  die." 

Saying  which,  having  now  lingered  to  the  last  possible  mo 
ment,  he  dashed  from  her  to  his  waiting  taxicab  —  his  own  car 
having  already  gone  by  express  —  with  just  five  minutes  to  catch 
his  train. 

From  the  drawing-room  window,  Carlisle  waved  her  hand  to 
him;  kissed  it,  too,  since  nobody  was  looking.  And  then  the  car 
leapt  forward  and  shot  away  out  of  sight  down  the  glistening 
street.  Hugo  was  gone,  and  Carlisle  was  alone. 

She  stood  at  the  window,  looking  out  blankly  into  the  leaden 
wetness.  It  was  just  after  five,  and  the  rain  poured.  A  curious 
depression  settled  quickly  upon  her,  which  was  hardly  fully 
accounted  for  as  "  missing  Hugo  already."  .  .  .  Why  ?  Who 
upon  earth  had  less  cause  for  depression  than  she?  No  girl  lived 
with  more  all-embracing  reasons  for  being  superlatively  happy. 
What,  then,  was  the  lack  in  her?  —  or  was  this  some  lack  in  the 
terms  of  life  itself?  Was  it  the  mysterious  law  of  the  world  that 
nobody,  no  matter  what  she  had  or  did,  should  ever  long  keep 
the  jewel  happiness  unspotted  by  a  doubt? 


XVII 

Colly  crosses  the  Great  Gulf;  and  it  is  n't  quite  Clear  how  she  will 
ever  cross  back  again. 

BAFFLING  questions  these,  even  to  young  philosophers. 
Dismissing  them  as  foolish,  Cally  Heth  turned  from  the 
rain-swept  window,  designing  to  rest  awhile  in  her  own 
room,  before  dressing  for  a  little  dinner  at  Evey  McVey's.  For 
saken  as  she  felt,  she  was  yet  not  unconscious  of  a  certain  re 
mote  desirability  in  being  alone;  that  is,  in  having  a  little  time 
to  herself  now.  It  occurred  to  her  that  perhaps  she  and  Hugo 
had  been  together  rather  too  constantly  in  these  weeks,  going 
forward  just  a  little  too  fast.  .  .  . 

In  the  hall  she  encountered  her  mother,  descending  the  stairs 
in  mackintosh,  hat,  and  veil.  Carlisle  looked  surprised,  but 
mamma's  look  under  the  veil  was  roguishly  dolorous,  in  refer 
ence  to  the  recent  farewell. 

"Why,  mamma,  where  are  you  going  in  all  the  rain?" 

Mrs.  Heth  replied:  "What,  no  tears!  ...  I'm  off  to  the  old 
Dabney  House,  my  dear  —  the  first  time  in  twenty  years  — " 

"Oh!  .  .  .The  Settlement!" 

"I  promised  Mr.  Dayne  I  would  go,"  said  the  capable  little 
lady,  eyeing  her  daughter  expectantly —  "it's  the  organization 
meeting  and  election  of  officers.  The  man  has  got  together  some 
excellent  people  for  his  committee.  And,  by  the  way,  Cally  — " 

"But  they  have  n't  raised  all  the  money  already!" 

At  this  Mrs.  Heth  looked  still  more  knowing.  "Confess, 
Cally  —  did  n't  Hugo  do  it?  Did  n't  he  make  another  big  sub 
scription  after  his  thousand?" 

Cally,  arrested  at  the  foot  of  the  steps,  stared  at  her  mother. 
"Why  —  not  that  I  know  of.  What  do  you  mean?" 

Now  her  mother  looked  somewhat  disappointed,  but  said, 
snapping  a  glove  button:  "It  would  be  like  him  to  do  it,  and  say 

216 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


not  a  word  to  anybody.  Why,  there 's  a  foolish  story  Mrs.  Wayne 
told  me  this  morning  that  the  whole  thing  had  fallen  through, 
when  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page  came  forward  anonymously  with  a 
gift  of  twenty-five  thousand  —  simply  buying  the  building  out 
right,  in  fact.  I  don't,  of  course,  believe  a  word  of  it.  She's 
exactly  the  kind  to  let  her  right  hand  know  what  her  left  was 
doing.  Still,  I  did  think  perhaps  Hugo  might  possibly  have  done 
something  of  the  sort.  He  was  so  interested  —  he  spoke  of  the 
Settlement  to  me  only  yesterday.  ..." 

The  girl  gazed  at  her  mother,  and  a  sudden  light  broke  into  her 
eyes.  Across  her  memory  there  flashed  Canning's  cryptic  remark, 
only  the  other  night:  "We'll  show  him  something  about  giving 
away  money  some  day.".  .  .  This,  then,  was  what  he  had  meant: 
perhaps  he  had  already  done  it  that  night.  She  knew  that  Hugo 
had  curiously  disliked  Dr.  Vivian  at  sight,  and  that,  by  the 
bond  between  her  and  him,  he  had  somehow  entered  into  her 
own  feminine  feeling  that  to  give  handsomely  to  the  fellow's  own 
charity  (to  which  he  himself  gave  nothing  at  all)  was  to  show 
him  up  completely  in  the  interest  of  public  morals.  The  gift  of 
such  a  sum  as  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  simply  exploded  him 
off  the  horizon.  .  .  . 

Her  heart  glowing  toward  her  understanding  lover,  she  clapped 
her  small  hands  and  cried:  "He  did!  —  I  remember  something  he 
said  about  it  now.  Oh,  I  know  he  did!" 

"I  felt  morally  certain  of  it,"  said  mamma,  calmly,  peering 
through  the  plate  glass  of  the  door.  "Don't  tell  me  Mary  Page 
would  do  a  thing  like  that.  Ah,  here  is  the  car  at  last.  .  .  ." 

Carlisle  said  with  sudden  eagerness:  "Do  wait  a  minute  for  me, 
mamma!  I  believe  I'll  go  to  the  meeting,  too." 

Naturally  some  discussion  followed  this  whimsical  request. 
The  upshot  was  that  Mrs.  Heth,  being  late  already,  promised  to 
send  the  car  back. 

Cally,  gloom  banished,  ran  up  the  stairs,  her  mother's  voice 
following  behind  like  a  trade-wind. 

"It's  to  be  in  the  office  of  that  Dr. Vivian  —  you  know?  .  .  . 
one  flight  up.  No  difficulty  in  finding  .  .  .  Sure  to  put  on  rub 
bers " 

217 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


The  last  words  to  be  distinctly  heard  were:  "Look  for  me 
right  up  at  the  front." 

In  her  own  room  Carlisle  flew  about  quite  blithely,  making 
ready  for  the  unexpected  excursion  with  odd  anticipations  beyond 
mamma's  guessing.  She  felt  grateful  to  Hugo,  attached  to  him 
by  a  new  tie;  for  he,  however  clearly  he  had  understood  it  himself, 
had  beautifully  put  her  in  just  that  position  toward  the  religious 
fellow  which  she  had  so  long  desired  to  occupy:  the  position,  in 
short,  of  overwhelming  moral  superiority.  How  easy  now,  choos 
ing  her  own  moment,  to  say  what  would  dispel  forever  the  man's 
odd  little  power  of  causing  her  to  worry.  .  .  . 

The  streets  were  slippery,  the  journey  was  from  pole  to  pole  of 
the  town'  and  yet  five  minutes  sufficed  for  it,  bringing  Settlement- 
ers  to  their  destination.  So  easily  does  forty  horse-power  traverse 
the  mile  between  Houses  of  Heth  and  Houses  of  Dabney.  Cally 
Heth  rolled  up  to  the  door  of  the  abandoned  hotel.  Large  and  dis 
mal  it  looked  in  the  slanting  rain.  Archaic,  too,  so  the  modern 
of  the  moderns  thought,  glancing  upward  over  the  face  of  the 
shabby  pile  as  the  car  halted,  and  William,  who  was  ever  atten 
tive  to  his  young  mistress,  sprang  out  with  the  umbrellas.  It  was 
an  odd  place  for  anybody  to  live,  certainly;  an  even  odder  place 
to  draw  in  storm  the  world  of  fashion  foregathering  to  its  bosom. 
Yet  this  indubitably  was  the  spot.  There  was  the  little  procession 
of  motor-cars,  lined  against  the  broken  sidewalk  in  the  wet,  to 
prove  it.  The  girl's  upward  eye  fell,  too,  upon  a  name,  inscribed 
in  white  paint  upon  a  window  directly  above  the  decayed  grand 
entrance: 

DR.  VIVIAN 

Carlisle  became  conscious  of  a  certain  excitement.  She  hoped 
very  much  that  they  had  n't  read  out  the  names  of  subscribers 
yet. 

She  was  late,  so  there  was  nobody  to  show  her  in.  From  the 
sidewalk  she  stepped  under  a  queer  little  portico,  which  seemed  to 
waft  one  back  to  a  previous  century.  Here,  at  the  vestibule  step, 
she  was  obliged  to  move  carefully  to  avoid  treading  on  two  dirty 
little  denizens  of  the  neighborhood,  who  knew  no  better  than 

218 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


to  block  the  way  of  the  quality.  They  were  little  Jew  girls,  — 
little  Goldnagels,  in  short,  —  and  while  one  of  them  sat  and 
played  at  jackstones  with  a  flat-looking  rubber  ball,  the  other 
and  smaller  lay  prone  upon  her  stomach,  weeping  with  passion 
ate  abandon. 

Her  agonized  wails  indicated  the  end  of  the  world,  and  worse. 
Carlisle  said  kindly: 

" What's  the  matter,  little  girl?" 

The  lamenting  one,  who  was  about  four  years  old,  rolled  around 
and  regarded  the  lady  with  a  contorted  face.  Her  wails  died  to 
a  whimper:  but  then,  curiosity  satisfied  and  no  solace  offering, 
she  burst  forth  as  with  an  access  of  mysterious  pain. 

"Did  she  hurt  herself?"  said  Carlisle,  third-personally,  to  the 
elder  girl,  who  had  suspended  her  game  to  stare  wide-eyed. 
"  What  on  earth  is  the  matter?" 

The  reply  was  tragically  simple: 

"  A  Lady  stepped  on  her  Junebug" 

Sure  enough,  full  on  the  vestibule  floor  lay  the  murdered  slum- 
bug,  who  had  too  hardily  ventured  to  cross  a  wealthy  benevolent Js 
path.  The  string  was  yet  tied  to  the  now  futile  hind-leg.  Carlisle, 
lingering,  repressed  her  desire  to  laugh. 

"Oh!  ...  Well,  don't  you  think  you  could  catch  her  a  new 
one,  perhaps?" 

"Bopper  he  mout  ketch  her  a  new  one  mebbe  to-morrow, 
mom.  .  .  .  Hiesh,  Rebecca!" 

Moved  by  some  impulse  in  her  own  buoyant  mood,  Carlisle 
touched  the  littlest  girl  on  the  shoulder  with  a  well-gloved  finger. 

"Here  —  Rebecca,  poor  child!  .  .  .  You  can  buy  yourself 
something  better  than  Junebugs." 

The  proprietor  of  the  deceased  bug,  having  raised  her  damp 
dark  face,  ceased  crying  instantly.  Over  the  astounding  windfall 
the  chubby  fingers  closed  with  a  gesture  suggesting  generations 
of  acquisitiveness. 

"Is  it  hers  to  keep?"  spoke  her  aged  sister,  in  a  scared  voice. 
"That  there's  a  dollar,  mom." 

"Hers  to  keep  ..."  replied  the  goddess,  smiling. 

But  her  speech  stopped  there,  shorn  of  a  donator's  gracious 

219 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 
frills,  and  the  smile  became  somewhat  fixed  upon  the  lovely 

HP. . . . 

There  had  appeared  a  man's  face  at  the  glass  of  the  old  doors, 
and  the  lady,  straightening  benignantly  to  sweep  on  to  her  tri 
umph  upstairs,  had  run  suddenly  upon  his  fixed  gaze.  Nothing, 
of  course,  could  have  been  more  natural  than  this  man's  appear 
ance  there :  who  upon  earth  more  suitable  for  door-keeper  to  the 
distinguished  visitors  than  he,  who  had  given  his  office  to  the 
Settlement  to-day,  in  lieu  of  more  expensive  gifts?  Yet  by  some 
flashing  trick  of  Carlisle's  imagination,  or  of  his  air  of  immobility, 
seen  darkly  through  the  glass,  it  was  almost  as  if  he  might  have 
been  waiting  there  for  her  alone.  .  .  . 

But  the  meeting  of  eyes  was  over  as  soon  as  it  began.  With  so 
prompt  a  courtesy  did  the  Dabney  House  physician  swing  open 
the  door  that  it  was  as  if  he  had  been  opening  it  all  along,  as  if  she 
had  n't  caught  him  looking  at  her.  .  .  . 

"How  do  you  do,  Miss  Heth?  .  .  .  Such  a  dreadful  day!  — 
you  were  brave  to  venture  out." 

"How  d'you  do?"  said  Carlisle,  in  the  voice  of  "manner,"  a 
rising  voice,  modulated,  distant  and  superior.  And  over  her 
shoulder,  she  addressed  the  little  Jew  girls,  with  an  air  of  more 
than  perfect  ease: 

"Well,  then,  good-bye!  Be  sure  to  catch  her  the  new  one  to 
morrow.  .  .  ." 

She  had  seen  that  the  strange  young  man  was  smiling.  And  by 
that  she  knew  that  he  remembered  their  last  meeting,  and 
wanted  to  trade  upon  her  queer  weakness  at  that  time,  pre 
tending  that  he  and  she  were  pleasant  acquaintances  together. 
Presently  she  should  inform  him  better  as  to  that.  But  why,  oh, 
why,  that  small  flinching  at  the  sight  of  him,  the  very  man  she 
had  fared  into  the  downpour  to  explode,  not  pausing  even  to 
mourn  her  lover's  going?  .  .  . 

"I'm  a  search-party  of  one,"  said  Dr.  Vivian,  throwing  wider 
the  door,  "  for  Mr.  Pond.  I  wondered  if  he  could  have  got  lost, 
somewhere  down  here  —  he  's  never  turned  up  yet." 

"Mr.  Pond?" 

"The  director  of  the  Settlement,  you  know,  when  it  opens  for 

220 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


business  in  the  fall.  He  happened  to  be  in  Washington,  and  was 
good  enough  to  run  down  to-day  to  make  us  a  little  address." 

"Oh." 

Carlisle  found  herself,  beyond  the  door,  in  a  quaint  high-ceiled 
court,  enfolded  with  peristyles  in  two  long  rows,  and  paved  with 
discolored  tiles  loose  under  the  foot.  At  the  farther  end  of  the 
court  there  ran  away  a  broad  corridor  into  the  dusk,  and  here 
also,  full  fifty  feet  distant,  rose  the  grand  stairway  with  ornate 
sweeping  balustrade  ending  in  a  tall  carved  ne^*el-post.  Obsolete 
and  ruined  and  queer  the  whole  place  looked,  indeed.  .  .  . 

"Luckily,"  added  Dr.  Vivian,  "I'm  in  good  time  to  serve  as  a 
guide." 

But  Miss  Heth  was  already  walking  past  him  with  an  expen 
sive  rustle,  moving  straight  toward  the  stairway.  For  this,  need 
less  to  say,  was  not  the  moment  to  speak  that  pointed  word  or 
two  which  should  unmask  the  man;  there  would  be  an  unavoid 
able  vulgarity  about  it  here,  in  this  solitude.  And  even  if  she 
should  get  no  further  opportunity  upstairs  —  well,  after  all,  the 
situation  spoke  for  itself;  nay,  thundered.  Had  not  Hugo  —  come 
to  think  of  it  —  struck  the  note  of  the  subtler  victory,  he  who 
had  given  magnificently  and  said  nothing?  Noblesse  oblige,  as  the 
Gauls  say 

"Oh,  no,  that's  not  necessary,"  she  replied,  walking  on.  "  There 
are  the  stairs.  ..." 

The  young  man  fell  in  behind  her. 

"The  old  house  is  really  quite  bewildering,  upstairs.  It  hap 
pened  that  my  office  was  the  only  place  available.  Perhaps  you 
will  let  me  show  you  — " 

"Oh,  I  don't  think  I  need  trouble  you,  thank  you." 

"It  is  no  trouble,"  said  V.  Vivian. 

Good  sentences  these,  and  well  pronounced.  With  them,  con 
versation  seemed  to  languish.  The  processional  pair  moved 
across  the  shadowy  court  in  entire  silence.  The  benevolent  lady 
led,  never  so  securely  entrenched  in  the  victorious  order,  the 
beloved  of  prodigal  Hugo  Canning,  to  whom  no  harm  should 
befall.  After  her  proceeded  the  slum  doctor:  the  hard  marble 
betrayed  the  inequality  of  his  footsteps.  A  minute  more  and  they 

221 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


would  be  upstairs,  swallowed  and  dispersed  in  the  publicity  of  the 
meeting.  Floor  and  ceiling  above  them  brought  down  the  sounds 
of  a  company  near  at  hand,  the  scraping  of  a  chair-leg,  the  muffled 
echo  of  voices.  Carlisle's  foot  trod  upon  the  bottom  step  of  the 
broad  stairway. 

"I  wonder  if  you  would  give  me  five  minutes  after  the  meeting, 
Miss  Heth?"  said  the  young  man's  voice  behind  her.  "There's 
a  —  a  matter  I've  wanted  very  much  to  speak  to  you  about." 

Cally's  heart  seemed  to  jump  a  little. 

"What  is  it  that  you  want  to  speak  to  me  about?"  she  asked 
coolly,  not  turning.  And,  to  her  own  surprise,  she  brought  her 
other  foot  up  on  the  stair. 

"Well,  it  concerns  the  Works,"  said  Vivian. 

And  he  added  at  once,  hastily:  "Oh,  nothing  that  you  need 
object  to  at  all,  I  hope.  Not  at  all.  ..." 

She  had  stopped  short  at  the  fighting- word,  and  turned,  pink- 
cheeked.  Certes,  there  was  a  point  at  which  noblesse  oblige  be 
comes  mere  flabby  spinelessness. 

And  upstairs  Mrs.  Heth,  complacent  right  up  at  the  front, 
craned  round  her  neck,  and  thought  that  Cally  was  very  long  in 
coming.  .  .  . 

"Yes?  What  about  the  Works?"  said  Cally,  her  breath  quick 
ening. 

"Oh,  I  don't  mean  to  detain  you  now,  of  course  — " 

"But  now  that  you  have  detained  me?"  she  pursued,  with  no 
great  polish  of  courtesy. 

The  young  man  raised  a  hand  and  pushed  back  his  hair,  which 
was  short  but  wavy.  It  was  observed  that  he  wore,  doubtless  in 
memory  of  his  uncle,  a  mourning  tie  of  grosgrain  silk,  replacing 
the  piquant  aquarium  scene. 

"I  could  hardly  explain  it  all  in  just  a  few  sentences,"  said 
he,  affecting  reluctance,  "  and  I  —  certainly  don't  want  to  give 
you  a  wrong  impression.  .  .  To  begin  quite  at  the  end,  I've  been 
wondering  if  I  —  I  might  be  allowed  to  make  one  or  two  small 
improvements  there,  at  the  Works,  I  mean,  —  in  fact,  out  of  a  — 
a  sort  of  fund  I  have." 

Carlisle  stared  at  him  spellbound.   She  stood  on  the  bottom 

222 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


step  of  the  old  grand  stairway,  one  gloved  hand  on  the  balus 
trade;  and,  as  she  so  stood,  her  eyes  just  came  on  a  level  with 
those  of  the  tall  doctor.  His  hare-brained  audacity  almost  took 
her  breath  away. 

"Oh,"  said  she.    "Out  of  a  fund  you  have." 

And  she  thought  wildly  of  accepting  his  offer  at  once,  com 
pelling  him  to  name  a  definite  sum,  just  for  the  fun  of  seeing 
how  he  would  wriggle  out  of  it  afterwards. 

"I'm  tremendously  interested  in  the  Works,  you  know,"  the 
man  rushed  on,  quite  as  if  he  found  encouragement  in  her  reply, 
"because  I  have  so  many  friends  who  work  there.  It's  to  gratify 
my  peace  of  mind,  just  to  know  that  they  have  —  everything 
they  need.  As  I  say,  I  happen  to  —  to  have  a  sort  of  fund  —  a 
little  public  fund,  you  might  say  —  for  —  for  purposes  of  the 
kind.  And  the  idea  of  outside  cooperation  in  such  a  matter  is 
a  perfectly  sound  one,  as  you  doubtless  know,  a  —  a  sound, 
advanced  socialistic  idea.  It's  simply  the  community  ac 
knowledging  some  responsibility  where  it  already  claims  the 
right  to  regulate  ..." 

At  this  point  her  stare  seemed  to  penetrate  him  with  a  doubt, 
and  he  said,  with  the  air  of  having  skipped  hastily  and  turned 
back: 

"I  mustn't  detain  you  now  to  give  the  full  argument,  of 
course,  but  I  assure  you  the  idea  is  sound  and  —  mutually 
beneficial,  as  I  believe.  Unfortunately,"  he  added,  with  a  certain 
embarrassment,  "I  don't  know  your  father." 

"Tell  me,"  said  Carlisle,  feeling  an  excitement  mounting  within 
her,  "how  is  it  that  you  are  always  thinking  up  these  plans  for 
doing  good  to  other  people  ?  " 

Before  Dr.  Vivian  could  meet  this  poser,  the  front  door  opened 
with  a  bang,  and  a  youngish  man  in  a  wet  yellow  raincoat  came 
striding  rapidly  across  the  court  toward  them.  He  was  a  power 
fully  built  man  with  a  blue-tinged  chin,  and  wore  the  air  of  a 
person  of  authority. 

"Meeting  not  begun  yet?"  he  demanded,  without  salutation, 
apparently  addressing  Carlisle.  "Thought  I  was  late." 

"Ah,  Mr.  Pond  —  glad  to  see  you,"  said  Vivian,  stepping  for- 

223 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


ward  a  little  to  meet  the  newcomer.    " They've  just  begun  — 
you'll  find  an  ovation  waiting  for  you." 

"In  your  office?  Aren't  you  going  up,  to  lead  the  ap 
plause?" 

The  doctor  bowed  gravely.  "In  my  office.  I'll  join  you  di 
rectly." 

"I  see,"  said  the  man,  nodding,  having  never  checked  his 
stride. 

But  all  that  he  had  seemed  to  see  with  his  keen  black  eyes  was 
the  lovely  girl  posed  on  the  last  step  of  the  ornamental  stairway. 
He  almost  brushed  against  her  as  he  strode  by. 

The  Pond  person's  footsteps  diminished  up  the  long  stairs. 
A  moment  later  a  volley  of  hand-clapping,  sounding  very  near, 
indicated  his  arrival  in  the  meeting-room.  But  his  interruption 
and  his  irritating  stare  had  accomplished  no  mollifying  purpose 
down  in  the  court.  But  one  end,  indeed,  could  justify  the  proud 
Miss  Heth  in  lingering  in  a  public  hall  with  the  slanderer  of  her 
self  and  her  family. 

"Doesn't  it  occur  to  you,"  she  said,  hardly  waiting  for  the 
intruder  to  get  out  of  earshot,  "that  so  much  preaching  about 
other  people's  business  seems  rather  —  odd,  coming  from  you?" 

Dr.  Vivian  now  affected  to  look  troubled. 

"There  was  just  that  difficulty,"  said  he,  slowly,  "that  you 
might  think  I  was  preaching.  I'm  not,  this  time,  really  — " 

"Don't  you  know  perfectly  well  you  only  said  that  in  a  —  a 
horrid  way  to  try  to  make  me  feel  uncomfortable?" 

She  paused  for  a  reply;  her  excitement  was  growing.  Her  figure 
was  enveloped  in  a  slim  raincoat  of  fine  gray ;  she  wore  a  yellow 
straw  hat  of  an  intriguing  shape,  and  over  it  a  white  veil  closely 
drawn  to  keep  the  wet  wind  from  her  face.  Now  and  then,  as  her 
eyes  moved,  a  descending  black-and-gold  eyelash  became  en 
tangled  with  this  veil;  that  occurrence,  in  fact,  took  place  at 
this  precise  moment,  creating  an  emergency  situation  of  some 
consequence.  It  was  a  matter  of  considerable  public  interest  to 
see  how  it  would  all  work  out.  However,  the  girl  merely  raised 
an  indifferent  hand,  and  plucked  the  veil  out  a  little.  The  man 
V.  V.  looked  hurriedly  away. 

224 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

He  was  saying:  "I  assure  you  I  meant  nothing  of  the  kind. 
However,  doubtless  it's  natural  that  you  should  think  so  — " 

"It  seems  very  natural  to  me  —  especially  here  in  the  new 
Settlement  building!  .  .  .  What  about  the  parable  of  the  rich 
young  man  now  ?  " 

He  stood  looking  at  her  without  a  reply;  one  of  his  quaint 
looks,  it  was. 

However,  Carlisle  knew  positively  that  he  did  not  want  to 
improve  the  Works  out  of  any  fund  he  pretended  to  have,  and 
was  resolved  to  show  him  no  mercy  now.  She  had  really  meant 
to  spare  him,  and  he,  mistaking  magnanimity  for  weakness,  had 
said  what  he  had  said.  On  his  head  be  it:  his  deceptive  trust 
ing  look  should  not  save  him  now. 

"Why  don't  you  say  something?"  she  demanded. 

The  young  man  gave  an  embarrassed  laugh. 

"Well,  to  tell  the  honest  truth,  I  don't  seem  to  think  of  any 
thing  to  say — " 

"Oh!  ...  So  the  Settlement  suggests  nothing  to  you  —  as  to 
picking  the  beam  from  your  own  eye?" 

"Not  at  this  moment,  I  think.  In  fact,  I  don't  seem  to  grasp 
at  all— " 

"Oh!"  said  Cally,  with  a  little  gasp. 

And  then,  stung  on  by  his  reckless  hardihood,  she  struck  to 
kill: 

"How  can  you  look  at  me,  and  pretend  that  you're  so  anxious 
to  help  other  people's  businesses,  when  you  know  you  would  n't 
even  give  to  your  own  Settlement  —  not  a  cent!" 

The  two  stood  facing  each  other,  hardly  a  yard  apart,  their 
eyes  dead-level.  V.  V.,  as  Henrietta  Cooney  called  him,  continued 
to  look  at  her,  and  though  he  was  far  from  a  florid  young  man,  it 
seemed  now  as  if  he  must  have  been  so,  so  much  color  did  he  have 
to  lose.  And  Cally  discovered  that  the  man  had  somehow  man 
aged  to  keep,  over  all  these  brilliant  weeks,  that  mysterious  trick 
he  had  of  making  her  feel  unfair,  and  even  rather  horrid  and 
common,  when  she  knew  perfectly  well  she  was  n't.  For  the 
look  on  his  unreliable  face  was  that  of  one  stabbed  from  be 
hind  in  a  company  where  he  had  trusted,  and  his  eyes  seemed 

225 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

to  be  saying  to  her  quite  distinctly:  "Don't  you  worry  about 
me!  Just  give  me  a  minute  or  two,  and  I'll  be  all  right.  ..." 

But  all  that  his  actual  voice  said,  in  rather  a  remote  way, 
was: 

"What  a  terrific  hypocrite  you  must  think  me!  ...  I  had  n't 
realized  ..."  ^ 

It  was  precisely  the  point  that  Carlisle  Heth  had  been  trying 
to  establish,  for  a  long,  long  time.  Yet  now,  in  the  moment  of 
triumph,  her  gaze  suddenly  wavered  from  his;  and  she  heard 
herself,  to  her  own  secret  confusion,  saying  hurriedly  and  weakly: 

"At  least,  I  understood  —  some  one  told  me  —  you  had  n't.  .  .  . 
Of  course  you  —  you  might  have  given  something,  and  —  this 
person  not  have  known.  ..." 

But  Jack  Dalhousie's  friend  only  answered,  in  the  same  de 
tached  way: 

"  It 's  unpardonable,  my  detaining  you  this  way.  I  'd  no  idea .  . . 
May  I  show  you  the  way  up  — " 

"No  — no!  Please  wait!  .  .  ." 

He  waited,  silent.  Carlisle,  having  paused  long  enough  to  take 
firm  hold  of  her  consciousness  of  vast  superiorities,  resumed 
more  strongly: 

"Perhaps  I  ought  to  explain  why  I  —  thought  that.  I  was  told 
that  the  whole  thing  had  fallen  through,  when  a  —  a  wealthy 
subscriber  stepped  in  and  secretly  gave  a  very  large  amount  — 
had  bought  the  building  for  you.  So  I  —  I  naturally  thought  — 

"It  was  absolutely  natural.  In  fact,  it's  quite  true.  .  .  .  Shall 
we  go  to  the  meeting  now?  " 

But  no,  something  in  her  required  that  he  must  state  in  plain 
words  the  fact  that  would  justify  her  accusation,  alleged  by  his 
eyes  to  be  so  unjust:  namely,  that  it  was  (practically)  a  member 
of  her  family  who  had  done  this  splendid  thing  for  him.  Yet  she 
went  rather  further  than  she  had  intended  when  she  said,  glanc 
ing  away  over  the  queer  dusky  court: 

"I  will  tell  you.  Some  one  gave  us  to  understand  —  not  he 
himself,  of  course,  —  that  it  was  a  friend  of  ours  who  had  done 
this  .  .  .  Mr.  Hugo  Canning." 

He  made  no  answer. 

226 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

An  uncontrollable  desire  carried  the  girl  yet  further.  She  said, 
in  a  weakening  voice: 

"Was  it?" 

In  saying  this,  she  brought  her  eyes  back  fully  to  her  victim. 
And  if  ever  guilt  was  written  large  upon  a  human  countenance,  it 
was  upon  the  face  of  V.  Vivian  at  that  moment.  Brightly  flushed 
he  was,  with  an  embarrassment  painful  to  witness.  And  yet,  so 
strange  is  the  way  of  life,  the  joy  of  victory  once  again  seemed  to 
slip  from  the  clutch  of  Cally  Heth.  What  house  of  cards  was  this 
she  had  pulled  down  upon  herself?.  .  . 

" Really,  you  must  appreciate,"  the  man  was  saying,  in  a 
light,  dry  voice,  "I  should  n't  feel  at  liberty  to  betray  a  secret 
of  that  sort,  even  if  I  knew.  I  'm  sorry,  but  — 

But  the  girl's  sickening  sensations  of  falling  through  space 
broke  out  in  faltering  speech: 

11  Oh!  ...  Do  you  mean  .  .  ."  She  halted,  to  steady  herself, 
and  took  a  fresh  start,  no  better  than  the  first:  "Do  you  mean  — 
that- 

"I  mean  only,  Miss  Heth,  that  I  haven't  the  slightest  idea 
what  this  is  all  about.  I  thought,"  he  said,  in  a  voice  of  increasing 
hardness,  "  that  we  were  talking  of  the  Works.  If,  at  another  time, 
you  can  give  me  a  few  minutes  — " 

"Was  it  YOU?"  said  Carlisle,  breaking  through  his  defenses 

"Do  you  mean  —  it  was  YOU,  all  along?  .  .  ." 

"I  mean  nothing  of  any  sort.  Does  it  occur  to  you  that  these 
questions  are  quite  unfair?  —  that  they  put  me  in  a  ..." 

She  demanded  in  a  small  voice:  "Did  you  buy  this  house  for 
the  Settlement?" 

Shot  down  with  the  point-blank  question,  the  tall  young  man, 
whose  coat  was  so  extremely  polished  at  the  elbows,  died  game, 
saying  with  sudden  gentleness: 

"No,  it  was  my  Uncle  Armistead." 

And  then  there  was  no  sound  but  the  steady  beat  of  the  rain 
upon  sidewalk  and  roofs.  .  . . 

Upstairs,  just  a  floor  and  a  ceiling  away,  Mrs.  Heth,  craning 
her  neck  for  the  last  time,  perceived  that  Cally  had  decided  not 
to  come  to  the  meeting;  also  that  it  was  just  as  well,  viewing  the 

227 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

inclement  weather.  Downstairs,  almost  directly  beneath  her, 
Cally  stood  front  to  front  with  the  family  enemy,  her  face  quite 
white. 

"Of  course  you  understand,"  the  enemy  was  saying,  hurriedly 
and  yet  firmly  too,  "he  gave  me  the  money  expecting  it  to  be 
used  for  the  public  good.  I  've  considered  that  I  merely  had  it 
in  trust,  as  a  fund  for  —  for  these  purposes,  as  I  've  explained. 
And  this  —  well,  you  may  easily  imagine  that  it  was  the  most 
perfect  form  of  self-indulgence.  .  .  .  I  've  gotten  so  fond  of  this 
old  place  .  .  .  But  I  can't  imagine  how  we  came  to  be  talking  of 
it,  and  I  beg  that  you'll  forget  the  whole  matter.  I  — my  uncle 
would  have  been  very  much  annoyed  to  —  to  have  it  known  or 
talked  about " 

Not  in  that  singular  experience  in  the  Cooney  parlor,  not  even 
in  the  memorable  New  Year's  moment  in  her  own  library,  had 
Carlisle  been  swept  with  such  a  desire  to  dissociate  herself  from 
her  own  person,  to  sneak  away  from  herself,  to  drop  through  the 
floor.  Nevertheless,  some  dignity  in  her,  standing  fast,  struck 
out  for  salvage;  and  out  of  the  uprush  of  humiliating  sensation, 
she  heard  her  voice,  colorless  and  flat: 

"I'm  sorry  I  said  that.  You  make  me  ...  quite  ashamed. .  .  ." 

The  flush  deepened  abruptly  on  the  tall  doctor's  cheek. 

"Don't  say  that!  Don't  you  suppose  I  understand  how  abso 
lutely  natural  it  was?  .  .  .  Everybody 'd  have  thought  just  the 
same,  in  your  place.  ..." 

Carlisle  had  turned  away  from  his  translucent  eye,  finding  it 
unbearable;  she  descended  from  the  stair,  took  an  irresolute  step 
or  two  over  the  ruined  floor  of  the  once  stately  court.  And  then 
she  halted,  having  really  nowhere  to  go,  staring  fixedly  toward 
the  distant  doors.  .  .  . 

Mamma's  nearness  could  not  help  her  now.  Hugo's  fortifying 
love  was  no  buffer  against  this  extraordinary  moment.  All  alone 
Cally  stood  with  the  contemned  religious  fellow  who  had  unhorsed 
and  disarmed  her  once  again,  and  now  there  would  be  no  more 
weapons.  And  there  was  a  worse  thing  here  than  her  mean 
looking  for  hypocrisy,  and  the  discovery,  instead,  of  a  mad 
generosity,  a  princely  folly.  Bad  enough  all  that  seemed;  very 

228 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


bad  indeed:  but  Cally's  painful  moment  seemed  to  cut  deeper 
yet. 

After  all  the  struggling,  had  it  come  to  this?  Was  the  au 
thor  of  the  Beach  opinion  of  her  a  man  whom  she  must  greatly 
admire?  .  .  . 

Behind  her  stood  the  stairway,  which  led  on  up  to  mamma  and 
the  embracing  security  of  the  victorious  order.  Behind  her  also 
stood  the  man,  the  royal  giver  of  the  granary  where  finer- 
feathered  birds  now  made  merry  among  the  spoils.  With  what 
speech  should  Cally  Heth,  mocked  and  jeered  by  her  feeble  "  I  'm 
sorry,"  turn  now  and  pass  him?  .  .  . 

She  heard  the  sound  of  his  unequal  footstep,  and  then  his  voice 
behind  her,  stirred  with  a  sudden  feeling: 

"Why,  it's  not  a  thing  to  be  sorry  about  —  how  could  you 
possibly  have  thought  otherwise?  .  .  .  Don't  you  suppose  I 
realize  what  cause  I  Ve  given  you  to  —  to  distrust  and  dislike 
me?  You  'd  be  more  than  human  if  you  could  forgive  and  forget 
—  what  I  said  to  you  one  night.  How  could  you,  when  it  was 
so  unforgivable?  And  since  then  — 

"Don't!"  Carlisle  said,  in  a  muffled  sort  of  voice.  And  then, 
clearly  and  distinctly:  "Don't!  ...  I  can't  quite  stand  that!" 

She  turned  on  the  old  floor,  with  the  sound  of  her  own  strength 
ening  voice,  and  came  again  face  to  face  with  the  man,  V.  V. 
There  had  seemed  to  come  to  her  a  light.  And  back  into  her 
smooth  young  cheek  trickled  that  color  so  loved  by  her  be 
trothed,  who  had  not  bought  the  Settlement  House  after  all.  ... 

She  was  a  brilliantly  successful  girl,  the  chosen  wife  of  the 
most  shiningly  eligible  of  men ;  and  he  was  a  lame  slum  doctor  in 
a  worn-out  suit,  beneath  her  notice  as  a  man  altogether.  And 
yet,  as  Hugo  stood  above  her  in  all  those  material  aspects  which 
had  always  summed  up  her  whole  demand  of  life,  so  this  man 
stood  above  her  in  some  more  subtle  and  mysterious  way.  And 
it  had  always  been  so:  by  bright  swift  flickers  of  intuition  she 
had  seemed  suddenly  to  see  that  now.  All  the  restlessness  and 
discontent  which  the  thought  and  sight  of  him  had  power  to 
awake  in  her  from  the  beginning  came  from  just  this;  and  she 
had  never  been  able  to  put  him  down,  no  matter  how  she  had 

229 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


chafed  and  denounced,  because  the  final  fact  had  always  been 
that  he,  in  his  queer  way,  stood  above  her.  .  .  . 

And  now,  in  this  unsteadied  moment,  with  all  hope  of  bring 
ing  him  down  beaten  finally  to  death,  there  had  seemed  to  rise  and 
beckon  a  finer  way  of  bridging  this  gap  between  them.  All  that 
was  best  in  the  girl  suddenly  rose,  demanding  for  once  to  be  al 
lowed  to  meet  the  shabby  alien  on  his  own  reckless  level. 

"Look  here,"  said  Cally,  with  a  kind  of  tremulous  eagerness, 
"I  want  to  tell  you  something.  ..." 

Yes,  surely  it  was  all  a  matter  between  herself  and  him:  she 
could  meet  his  eyes  now  with  no  sense  that  did  not  add  to  her 
curious  inner  exaltation.  Had  not  these  eyes  said  to  her  from  the 
beginning  that  they  would  give  her  no  peace  till  she  came  to 
this?  .  .  . 

"You  were  right  to  say  what  you  did  that  night.  A  puff  of 
wind  blew  the  boat  over  after  he  got  out.  Mr.  Dalhousie  never 
knew  I  was  upset." 

The  words  dropped  unafraid  into  a  perfect  silence.  The  girl's 
manner  was  as  simple,  as  undramatic,  as  possible.  Yet,  consider 
ing  who  these  two  were,  considering  the  intentions  with  which 
she  had  entered  his  Dabney  House  not  ten  minutes  before,  no 
more  startling  words  could  have  been  devised  by  the  wit  of 
man. 

"He  never  knew,"  repeated  Vivian,  in  a  voice  suddenly  me 
chanical. 

No  doubt  it  was  by  his  good  fortune  alone  that  he  had 
avoided  any  alarming  change  of  expression,  as  he  listened  to  the 
announcement  which  seemed  to  shake  and  stagger  his  visible 
world.  The  girl  was  soaring  upon  her  unimagined  moment  of 
spiritual  adventure.  But  V.  Vivian  stood  like  a  man  turned  to 
stone,  gazing  blind  into  a  void.  .  .  . 

Presently,  out  of  the  general  chaos  the  young  man's  dazed 
mind  stirred;  leapt  to  life.  Thought  shook  him  through  like 
waves  of  pain.  It  came  upon  him  first,  with  crushing  force,  that 
this  sweet- voiced  girl  with  a  face  like  all  the  angels  had  after  all 
coldly  lied,  murderously  lied,  and  maintained  her  lie  through 
many  months.  Hard  upon  that,  blotting  it  out,  there  swept  the 

230 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


juster  knowledge  that,  no  matter  what  she  had  done,  truth  had 
triumphed  at  last;  what  was  good  in  her  had  overcome  her  poor 
weakness.  Lastly,  he  thought  of  Jack  Dalhousie  who,  from  the 
clouds,  had  received  his  release  from  prison.  Yes,  old  Dal  could 
come  home  now.  .  .  . 

"He  never  knew,"  said  V.  V.,  in  his  curious  voice.  "I'm  so 
glad  .  .  .  This  clears  him  ...  I  never  understood  how  he  could 
have  ...  I'm  so  glad  to  —  have  it  settled.  .  .  ." 

If  he  was  so  glad,  his  face  libelled  him  past  forgiveness.  But 
Cally  Heth  still  soared,  too  high  in  the  unplumbed  blue  to  note, 
even  now,  what  house  was  this  she  had  destroyed. 

"I  really  did  n't  realize  at  all  at  the  time,"  she  said,  with  the 
same  simplicity.  "It  all  happened  so  quickly,  and  it  was  so 
bewildering,  and  I  did  n't  have  time  to  think.  The  story  about 
him  just  seemed  to  spring  up  of  itself,  and  then  it  grew  and  grew 
all  the  time.  I've  worried  a  great  deal  about  it,  all  along.  .  .  ." 

A  kind  of  passion  came  into  the  man's  face,  and  he  said: 

"Thank  God,  there's  still  time  to  make  it  all  right." 

Then  his  look  brought  her  down  a  little.  ...  "To  make  it 
all  right?" 

Vivian  gazed  down.  He  thought  of  what  lay  ahead  for  her 
now;  and  his  heart  seemed  to  turn  within  him.  .  .  .  However, 
sympathy  was  not  desired  of  him :  his  lot  was  but  to  strengthen 
the  hands  of  the  brave. 

"Miss  Heth  —  indeed,  I  could  envy  you  all  the  happiness  you 
are  going  to  give.  Think  —  just  think  what  it  means  ...  I  know 
you  must  be  eager  —  to  begin,  to  — " 

"To  begin?"  she  echoed  again,  feeling  somehow  that  their 
privacy  was  being  invaded.  "Why  —  what  do  you  mean?  ...  I 
don't  understand." 

"I  jump  ahead  too  fast,  of  course.  But  —  you  must  be  so 
anxious  ...  to  have  it  all  off  your  mind,  and  not  think  of  it  any 
more.  I  know  you  must  be  impatient  to  get  word  to  Dal  at 
the  first  possible  moment  —  it  means  so  much  to  him.  More  than 
meat  and  drink.  .  .  .  And  then  there's  his  poor  old  father  .  .  ." 

Cally  stared  at  him,  speechless.  There  was  no  exaltation  now; 
no  more  soaring.  Rooted  in  her  tracks  she  stood,  yet  seemed  to 

231 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

herself  to  shrink  and  recoil  from  him,  in  her  sudden  self-horror. 
What,  oh  what,  had  she  done? 

And  by  chance  at  this  very  moment  —  doubtless  through  some 
Settlementer's  opening  a  door  for  air — there  came  floating  down 
to  her  the  distinct  voice  of  her  mother,  the  strong  voice  of  author 
ity  and  no  nonsense,  the  voice  of  Wealth  and  Permanence,  of 
the  victorious  knowledge  that  God  thinks  twice  before  he  con 
demns  a  person  of  quality.  ...  "In  accepting  the  Chairmanship 
of  the  Finance  Committee,  I  desire  to  say  ..." 

Cally  raised  a  gloved  little  hand  to  her  veiled  lips.  Plainer 
than  speech  her  frightened  eyes  said:  Hast  thou  found  me,  O  mine 
enemy  ? 

"You  —  you've  misunderstood.  No  ...  no!  I  didn't  mean 
that  at  all." 

"Oh!  ...  Do  you  mean  —  you  don't  wish  to  see  Colonel 
Dalhousie  —  personally?  Of  course  not!  ...  It  wouldn't  be 
necessary  in  the  least.  Perhaps  you  would  let  me.  .  .  .  And  as  to 
a  telegram  to  Dal—" 

"No  —  no!  .  .  .  You  mustn't  go  to  see  him.  You  mustn't 
send  a  telegram.  I  can't  allow  that  —  you've  misunderstood 
entirely.  You  must  n't  tell  anybody.  .  .  ." 

They  stared  at  each  other  with  the  same  colorless  faces,  and 
again  the  rain  became  audible.  In  the  man's  too-confiding  eyes, 
hope  died  hard. 

"Not  tell  anybody?  Why,  I  don't  see  ...  There's  no  other 
way  of  making  it  right,  I'm  afraid.  .  .  .  And  you  have  told 

me " 

"But  I  did  n't  tell  you  to  tell  anybody  else.  I  did  n't.  I  only 
meant  to  tell  you,  don't  you  see?  .  .  ." 

This  subtlety  was  past  the  vision  of  the  donator  of  the  Dabney 
House.  North,  south,  east,  or  west,  he  could  see  nothing  but  a 
seraph-faced  girl  whose  misery  it  was  to  feel  the  penitential 
pangs,  yet  not  be  able  quite  to  rise  to  the  fulness  of  reparation. 
That  she  had  reached  for  that  fulness  was  to  him  the  one  thing 
certain  in  all  the  world.  What  want  of  delicacy  in  him  had 
caused  her  to  falter  and  look  backward?  .  .  . 

Into  the  lucid  gray  of  his  eyes  had  come  that  look  which 

232 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


more  than  once  before  Carlisle  Heth  had  found  intolerable.  Lit 
tle  she  recked  for  it  now.  Was  not  this  the  heart  of  her  present 
dilemma,  that  she  had  already  followed  his  ocular  incitements  too 
fatally  far?  By  what  religious  prestidigitation  he  had  trapped 
her  secret  from  her  must  remain  a  thick  mystery  now.  Nothing 
mattered  but  that  he,  having  deceitfully  seemed  to  agree  that 
it  was  all  a  matter  between  herself  and  him,  should  not  now 
turn  and  betray  her.  .  .  .  Tell  now  ?  The  sudden  vista  of  scan 
dal  horrified  her.  How  would  she  ever  face  mamma  again? 
How  would  Hugo,  whose  bride  and  pride  she  was,  regard  her 
then?  .  .  . 

"Don't  you  see?"  she  said,  with  gathering  tensity  —  "I  —  I 
meant  it  as  a  confidence  to  you.  You  must  n't  dream  of  telling 
anybody  else.  ..." 

"But  neither  you  nor  I  own  the  truth.  This  belongs  to 
Dalhousie.  .  .  ." 

"  Oh,  it  doesn't!  —  it  does  n't!  How  can  you!  You  misunder 
stand!  —  What  I  said  to  you  gave  you  a  totally  wrong  impres 
sion.  He  was  entirely  to  blame  for  my  upsetting.  Entirely!  He 
behaved  abominably  —  and  I  — " 

"Tell  now!"  cried  the  man,  with  his  strange  stern  passion. 
"Once  it's  done,  you'll  always  be  glad.  Don't  you  know  you 
must,  now!  Don't  you  see  you  can't  be  happy,  till  you  let  the 
truth  be  known?  ..." 

There  came  from  above  the  unmistakable  movement  of  chairs, 
the  sound  of  many  feet.  It  appeared  that  the  Settlement  meeting 
was  breaking  up.  The  man's  entreaties  bounded  back  dead. 

"I  couldn't!  —  Don't  you  understand?  There's  nothing  to 
tell.  It  was  not  my  fault.  The  story  was  distorted,  distorted,  and 
distorted!  I  regretted  that  as  much  as  any  one.  But  I  could  do 
nothing,  nothing  to  stop  it.  And  don't  you  understand  I  could  n't 
possibly  tell  this  broadcast  now,  when  it 's  been  done  with  for 
months!  What  would  people  think  of  me?  Don't  you  — " 

"What  will  you  have  to  think  of  yourself  if  you  don't  tell?" 

But  the  hard  shot  missed  fire,  the  reason  being  that  what  she 
thought  of  herself  did  not  matter  in  the  least  just  now.  She  was 
mamma's  daughter,  Hugo  Canning's  betrothed,  fighting  for  her 

233 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

own :  and  now  that  movement  upstairs  warned  her  that  she  had 
no  moment  to  lose. 

Carlisle  seized  the  slum  doctor's  arm  with  a  resolute  little 
hand.  Her  voice,  though  panicky,  was  as  inexorable  as  mamma's 
own. 

"Promise  me,"  said  she,  "that  you  will  never  repeat  to  any 
body  what  I  told  you  in  confidence." 

The  face  of  the  young  man,  which  was  usually  so  harmless- 
looking,  had  suddenly  become  quite  stern.  He  looked  as  if  he 
might  ask  God  to  pity  her  again,  given  a  very  little  more.  When 
he  spoke,  he  spoke  brusquely: 

"What  you  ask  is  a  conspiracy  of  silence.  I  cannot  make  such 
a  promise.  I  cannot." 

"Oh,  how  can  you  be  so  hard!  You've  never  meant  anything 
but  trouble  to  me  since  the  first  minute  I  saw  you!  It  is  n't  fair, 
don't  you  see  it  is  n't?  This  has  happened  so  suddenly  —  I  must 
have  time  to  think.  Promise  that  you  won't  say  anything  — 
at  least  till  you  hear  from  me  again.  ..." 

Silence.  And  then  V.  Vivian  said,  in  a  suddenly  hopeless 
voice: 

"I  will  agree  to  say  nothing  without  first  seeing  you.  ..." 

Cally  Heth  dropped  his  arm  instantly,  turned  from  him.  She 
fled,  not  up  the  grand  stairway,  but  over  the  court  for  the  doors, 
with  the  protecting  arms  of  the  House  of  Heth  beyond.  And 
none  of  her  other  routs  from  the  family  enemy  had  been  quite 
like  this  one. 


XVIII 

Night-Thoughts  on  the  Hardness  of  Religious  Fellows,  compelling 
you  to  be  Hard,  too;  Happier  Things  again,  such  as  Hugo, 
Europe,  Trousseaux,  etc.',  concluding  with  a  Letter  from  Texas 
and  a  Little  Vulgarian  in  a  Red  Hat. 

^HE  tireless  William  retraced  the  wet  streets  to  the  Dab- 
ney  House  in  ample  time  for  Mrs.  Heth,  but  the  Chair 
man  of  the  Finance  Committee,  being  in  agreeable  con 
verse  with  fellow  philanthropists,  came  home  in  Mrs.  Byrd's 
car  instead,  after  all.  Accorolingly  she  did  not  say  to  William, 
"Miss  Carlisle  decided  not  to  come, Banks?"  —  which  she  liked 
to  call  William  for  the  English  sound  of  it  —  and  Banks,  or 
William,  did  not  look  respectfully  surprised  and  say,  "Yas'm, 
she  came.  .  .  ." 

Arriving  at  home,  the  good  little  lady  presently  ascended  to 
the  third  floor,  where  she  entered  her  daughter's  room  without 
knocking,  according  to  her  wont.  However,  Carlisle  had  been 
ready  for  her  for  some  time. 

"You  stayed,"  was  mamma's  arch  conjecture,  "to  write  a 
ream  to  Hugo,  dear  fellow,  I  suppose?  .  .  ." 

"No,  I  went!"  said  Cally,  now  in  the  last  stages  of  an  evening 
toilette.  "Only  when  I  got  there,  and  peeped  in,  it  all  looked  so 
dreary  and  hopeless  that  my  heart  failed  me,  and  I  turned  right 
around  and  came  back!  Was  it  — " 

"You  did!  How  long  were  you  there?  There's  a  little  too 
much  powder  on  your  nose,  my  dear  —  there!  Did  you  come 
upstairs?" 

"Oh,  no!  I  just  slipped  in  for  a  moment  or  two  and  glanced 
about  that  queer  old  court  downstairs.  Quaint  and  interesting, 
is  n't  it?  How  was  the  meeting?" 

"Most  interesting  and  gratifying,"  said  mamma,  sinking  into 
a  rose-lined  chair.  "We  begin  a  noble  work.  You  may  go  now, 

235 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

Flora.  I  am  made  a  governor,  as  well  as  chairman  of  the  most 
important  committee.  .  .  ." 

She  monologized  for  some  time,  in  a  rich  vein  of  reminiscence 
and  autobiography,  revealing  among  other  things  that  she  had 
rather  broadly  hinted,  to  Mrs.  Byrd  and  others,  who  was  the 
anonymous  donor  of  the  Settlement  House;  a  certain  wealthy 
New  Yorker,  to  wit.  However,  it  was  clear  that  she  saw  nothing 
amiss,  nor  did  she  say  anything  more  germane  to  her  daughter's 
inner  drama  than,  in  the  moment  of  parting: 

"Rub  your  cheeks  a  little  with  the  soft  cloth.  You  look  quite 
pale." 

Carlisle  rubbed  faithfully,  aware  of  a  lump  of  lead  where  her 
heart  should  have  been.  Later  she  went  downstairs,  and  then 
on  for  dinner  at  the  McVeys'.  Most  grateful  she  was  for  this 
mental  distraction;  to-night  she  would  have  played  three-hand 
bridge  with  papa  and  Mat  tie  Allen  with  enthusiasm. 

Evey's  dinner,  of  course,  was  far  ahead  of  three-hand.  The 
McVeys  were  very  rich,  far  richer  than  the  Heths  (theirs  had  been 
the  marriage  of  McVey's  Drygoods  and  Notions,  Wholesale  Only, 
and  Herkimer's  Fresh  Provisions),  and  were  considered  "not 
quite  "  by  some  people,  though  Evey  certainly  went  everywhere 
and  was  very  refined.  Accordingly,  the  evening's  viands  were  of 
the  best  and  the  table  talk  at  least  good  enough  for  all  practical 
purposes.  Carlisle,  who  was  almost  feverishly  animated,  lingered 
till  the  last  possible  moment:  Evey  actually  asked  her  to  spend 
the  night,  and  she  actually  came  very  near  doing  it.  Escorted 
home  in  a  maritime  hackney-coach  by  young  Mr.  Robert  Tell- 
ford  (whose  heart  had  been  lacerated  by  rumors  that  persistently 
reached  him),  Canning's  betrothed  permitted  Robert  to  linger  in 
the  library,  positively  detained  him  in  the  library,  till  eleven- 
thirty  o'clock:  courtesies  which  would  have  run  like  wine  to  the 
young  Tellford  head  but  for  the  lady's  erratic  and  increasing 
distraitness. 

The  bibulous  metaphor  is  here  reversible.  It  possessed  mutu 
ality,  so  to  say.  Cally  herself  would  drown  trouble  to-night  with 
intoxicating  draughts  of  human  society.  But  there  came  a  time 
when  this  resource  was  denied  her;  when  the  human  bars  closed, 

236 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


as  it  were;  in  short,  when  all  the  society  in  reach  must  sorrowfully 
put  on  his  tall  hat  and  go.  And  then  there  came  the  nocturnal 
stillness  of  the  house,  and  then  the  solitariness  of  the  bedcham 
ber,  and  after  that  the  dark. 

Now  the  question  that  had  rumbled  all  evening  cloud-like  in 
the  background  of  her  consciousness,  swam  and  took  shape  in  the 
midnight  shadows,  dangling  before  the  eye  of  her  mind  in  gigan 
tic  and  minatory  capitals: 

WOULD  HE  TELL? 

To  this  stark  inquiry  all  the  girl's  problem  came  down.  Gone 
like  a  fever-mist  was  the  emotional  flare-up  (as  mamma  would 
have  said)  which  had  tricked  her  into  blurting  out  a  secret 
scarcely  even  formulated  before  in  her  own  inmost  soul.  That 
mysterious  moment  remained  merely  as  an  astonishment.  It 
was  the  strangest  thing  that  had  ever  happened  to  her;  she  had 
simply  been  swept  away  by  some  unfathomable  madness.  And 
at  present  Nature's  first  law  was  working  in  her  with  obliterat 
ing  force.  Would  the  man  tell?  Here  in  the  sane  and  ordered 
surroundings,  with  mamma  sleeping  and  satisfied  one  floor  be 
low,  and  a  long,  long  letter  to  be  written  to  her  knight  among 
men  the  first  thing  to-morrow,  there  was  nothing  in  the  world 
that  mattered  but  that.  If  Vivian  would  not  tell,  then,  indeed, 
all  was  well  with  her.  If  he  did  tell  .  .  . 

He  had  said  that  he  would  not  tell  without  first  seeing  her. 
But  of  course  there  was  nothing  under  heaven  to  prevent  his 
seeing  her,  or  sending  word  to  her,  at  any  time,  by  day  or  by 
night.  And  then  what? 

Carlisle  lay  upon  her  back,  rather  small  and  frightened  in  the 
tall  bed,  struggling  to  pluck  away  the  veil  from  the  face  of  the 
menacing  future.  What  would  "telling"  mean,  exactly?  .  .  . 

There  was  a  hopeful  view.  The  whole  thing  was  so  confused, 
just  as  he  himself  had  admitted,  more  than  once.  It  might  all  be 
put  on  the  ground  of  a  mistake,  a  little  misunderstanding,  re 
cently  discovered.  You  could  tell,  and  not  go  into  all  the  mixed- 
up  details.  Jack  Dalhousie  would  then  gratefully  return  from 

237 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Texas  (where  he  was  really  getting  on  much  better  than  he  had 
ever  done  at  home  —  Dr.  Vivian  had  practically  said  so) ;  his 
father  would  quietly  take  him  back;  and  it  would  be  generally 
understood  that  Jack  was  not  a  coward  now,  and  was  greatly 
improved  morally  by  the  disciplinary  exile,  and  everything  would 
be  all  right.  But  of  course  the  difficulty  here  was  that  somebody 
(like  Colonel  Dalhousie,  for  instance)  might  think  to  ask  why 
the  discovery  of  the  little  misunderstanding  came  now,  instead 
of  six  months  ago.  You  could  hardly  reply  to  such  an  one  that 
you  had  just  discovered  the  mistake  as  the  result  of  a  flare- 
up,  caused  by  a  slum  doctor's  giving  twenty-five  thousand 
dollars  to  buy  an  old  hotel.  Who  would  understand  that,  when 
you  did  n't  yourself?  . 

Carlisle,  indeed,  being  a  practical  girl,  did  not  linger  long  on  the 
optimistic  prospect.  For  to-night  at  least,  " telling"  seemed  a 
matter  too  dreadful  to  contemplate.  Colonel  Dalhousie  was  an 
irascible  and  solitary  widower  with  one  son  whom  he  had  once 
been  proud  of;  and  this  son,  having  been  strangely  compelled  to 
take  a  lady's  word  as  to  his  own  conduct,  had  been  disgraced  by 
that  word,  cast  out  with  his  father's  curse  upon  his  forehead. 
Was  it  likely  that  these  two  would  take  the  discovery  of  a 
little  misunderstanding  now  with  a  charming  quiet  courtesy?  — 
that,  shouting  the  discovery  abroad  to  save  their  faces,  they 
would  have  due  regard  for  careful  qualifications  and  for  strik 
ing  the  right  note?  The  reply  was  the  negative:  it  was  not  at 
all  likely. 

Cally  knew  the  world's  rough  judgments,  where  all  is  black  or 
all  is  white,  and  ifs  and  buts  go  overboard  as  spoiling  the  strong 
color  scheme.  And  well  she  knew  the  way  of  horrid  gossip;  none 
better.  That  she,  Carlisle  Heth,  had  deliberately  lied  merely  to 
save  her  name  from  public  association  with  young  Dalhousie's, 
and  by  this  lie  had  ruined  a  boy  who  in  his  way  had  loved  her 
well:  such  would  be  the  story  which  the  angry  Colonel  (perhaps 
coming  to  shoot  papa  besides)  would  throw  to  the  four  winds, 
to  be  rolled  in  the  mouth  of  gossip  forevermore.  O  what  a  tasty 
morsel  was  here,  my  countrymen !  .  .  . 

Staring  fearfully  into  the  dusk,  Carlisle  pictured  herself  as 

238 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

hearing  such  a  story  about  Evey  or  Mattie:  she  perceived  at 
once,  with  sickening  sensations,  how  intensely  she  would  be 
interested  in  it.  Yes;  once  started,  it  would  sweep  through  draw 
ing-rooms  and  clubs  like  fire.  With  what  glee  would  the  world's 
coarse  tongue  make  its  reprisals  upon  brilliant  success!  Town- 
talk  the  lovely  Miss  Heth  would  be,  spotted  all  over  with  that 
horrid  tattle  from  which  she  (and  Hugo)  had  ever  so  shuddered 
and  shrunk.  .  .  . 

And  against  this  threatened  avalanche,  entailing  who  knew 
what  consequences,  she  had  but  the  frail  shield  of  the  sense  of 
honor  —  well,  then,  say,  the  sense  of  chivalry  —  of  a  man  far 
beneath  her  world,  whom  she  had  frequently  told  herself  that  she 
disliked  and  despised. 

A  pale  yellow  ray  of  the  moon,  journeying  upward  over  the 
coverlet,  fell  across  her  face.  She  rose,  pattered  on  slim  bare  feet 
over  the  chequered  floor,  lowered  the  shade.  Inside  and  out,  all 
the  world  was  still.  Cally  dropped  down  on  her  chaise-longue  by 
the  window,  very  wide  awake.  .  .  .  And,  gradually,  since  she 
was  practical,  she  formed  a  plan  of  action:  a  plan  so  simple  that 
she  wondered  she  had  not  thought  of  it  at  once.  .  .  . 

A  long  time  she  had  spent  in  trying  to  think  how  she  might 
compel,  cajole,  or  bribe  the  man  at  the  Dabney  House  to  pledge 
her  his  eternal  silence.  But  she  had  not  been  able  to  think  of  any 
promising  way:  each  time,  she  brought  up  confronting  with  pain 
ful  fascination  the  conviction  that  religious  fellows  were  hard. 
And  out  of  this  conviction  there  grew,  in  time,  her  own  resolve. 
Well,  then,  she  would  be  hard,  too.  She  would  avoid  seeing  or 
having  any  communication  with  Dr.  Vivian,  and  if  he  dared  to 
repeat  anything,  she  would  simply  laugh  it  all  aside.  She  would 
deny  that  she  ever  said  any  such  preposterous  thing  in  her  life. 
She  would  have  to  do  that;  her  duty  to  others  demanded  it.  ... 
And  what  could  he  do  then?  It  would  merely  be  his  word  against 
hers,  Miss  Heth's.  He  would  be  left  in  a  most  unpleasant  posi 
tion.  .  .  . 

In  this  position  V.  Vivian  remained  while  Carlisle  slept.  How 
ever,  the  new  day,  as  it  pleasantly  proved,  brought  no  need  for 
such  severe  measures.  Many  rings  at  doorbell  and  telephone 

239 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


Cally's  strained  ears  heard  between  getting  up  and  bedtime,  but 
the  hard  ring  of  Nemesis  was  never  among  them.  All  day  silence 
brooded  unbroken  in  the  direction  of  the  Dabney  House.  And 
when  another  morning  wore  to  evening,  and  no  heart  brake,  and 
yet  another  and  another,  there  descended  again  upon  the  girl 
the  peaceful  sense  of  re-won  security.  .  .  . 

In  these  days  the  House  of  Heth  was  in  a  continual  bustle.  On 
Tuesday  next  —  a  week  to  a  day  from  the  Settlement  meeting  — 
the  ladies  were  to  depart  for  New  York,  Hugo,  and  Europe,  the 
Trousseau  and  the  Announcement,  to  return  no  more  till  mid- 
September.  On  the  same  day  the  titular  master  of  the  house  was 
to  go  off  for  a  five  days'  fishing  junket,  thence  flying  to  New  York 
for  the  "seeing  off,"  and  soon  thereafter  starting  out  for  a  three 
weeks'  business  trip  to  the  Far  West.  Along  with  the  various 
domestic  problems  raised  by  this  programme,  there  were  all  the 
routine  duties  of  the  season  to  be  attended  to.  Cold-weather 
things  must  still  be  salted  down  with  camphor  balls  and  packed 
away;  costly  pictures  provided  with  muslin  wrappers;  drawing- 
room  furniture  with  linen  slip-covers;  rooms  cleaned  and  locked 
up,  doors  and  windows  screened  and  awninged.  Mrs.  Heth 
went  dashing  from  one  bit  of  generalship  to  another,  and  tele 
phoned  ten  thousand  times  a  day.  Nevertheless  she  kept  eyes 
in  her  head,  and  accordingly  she  observed  to  Mr.  Heth  one  starlit 
night,  as  they  sat  a  deux  on  the  little  front  balcony  where  flower 
ing  window-boxes  so  refinedly  concealed  one  from  the  public 
view: 

"I  never  saw  a  girl  so  absolutely  naive  about  showing  her  feel 
ings.  She  began  to  droop  the  minute  he  left  the  house,  and  has  n't 
been  her  natural  self  since.  .  .  .  Irritable!  —  till  you  can't  say 
good  morning  without  her  snapping  your  head  off." 

"Maybe,  it's  the  weather,"  suggested  Mr.  Heth,  who  wore  a 
white  flannel  suit  and  fanned  himself  with  a  dried  palm-leaf.  "And 
I  reckon,  too,  she's  feeling  sorry  to  leave  her  old  father  for  such  a 
long  time.  Four  months  —  hio ! " 

"Cally  's  not  the  girl  to  get  black  rings  under  her  eyes  for 
things  like  that." 

She  added  presently:  "It's  a  pure  love-match,  which  is  natu- 

240 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

rally  a  gratification  to  me,  who  brought  the  whole  thing  about. 
'Thank  God,  Cally,  you've  got  a  mother,'  I  said  to  her  only  the 
other  day.  But  I  do  say  there 's  such  a  thing  as  carrying  love  just 
a  little  too  far." 

Cally,  meantime,  while  affecting  no  interest  in  summer  clothes 
for  chairs,  kept  as  closely  occupied  with  her  own  affairs,  social 
activities  and  preparations  for  the  brilliant  absence,  as  mamma 
did  with  hers.  Much  time  went,  too,  to  her  correspondence  with 
Canning,  who  wrote  her  daily  fat  delightful  letters,  all  breathing 
ardent  anticipation  of  her  approaching  visit  in  his  own  city. 
And  back  to  Canning,  she  wrote  even  fatter  letters  every  morn 
ing  in  mamma's  sitting-room,  dear  letters  (he  thought  them) 
in  which  she  told  him  every  single  thing  except  what  she  was 
really  thinking  about.  .  .  . 

And  why  should  n't  she  tell  Hugo  that  also?  Once  or  twice  she 
really  came  very  near  doing  it.  For  as  her  mind  had  become  re 
leased  from  her  first  acute  apprehensions,  it  had  seemed  to  insist 
on  turning  inward  a  little ;  and  there  grew  within  her  a  sense  of 
unhappiness,  of  loneliness,  a  feeling  of  her  poor  little  self  against 
the  world.  She  longed  for  some  one  to  explain  it  all  to,  to  justify 
herself  before;  and  who  more  appropriate  in  this  connection 
than  her  lover?  That  Hugo  might  have  been  shocked,  and  per 
haps  disgusted,  to  have  the  misunderstanding  discovered  to  him 
by  way  of  the  Dalhousies'  megaphone  was,  indeed,  likely;  but 
to  have  her  quietly  tell  it  to  him,  as  it  really  happened,  with  the 
proper  stress  on  circumstances  and  gossip,  would  be  quite  another 
matter.  She  felt  almost  certain  that  he  would  agree  with  her 
at  once  that  it  would  be  a  great  mistake  to  rake  up  all  this  now, 
when  it  had  all  blown  over  and  Dalhousie  was  doing  so  splendidly 
down  in  Texas.  .  .  . 

However,  Cally  procrastinated.  And  then,  Sunday  morning 
in  church,  as  she  sat  pensively  wishing  for  a  confidant,  it  came 
upon  her  somewhat  startlingly  that  she  already  had  one:  Dr. 
Vivian  was  her  confidant.  Did  he  not  know  more  about  her 
than  anybody  else  in  the  world?  .  .  . 

The  simple  thought  seemed  to  cure  her  instantly  of  her  wish. 
She  had  tried  having  a  confidant  and  it  had  brought  her  to  this; 

241 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


henceforward  let  her  keep  her  own  counsel.  (So  she  mused,  walk 
ing  homeward  in  the  brilliant  sunshine  and  light  airs  with  J.  For- 
sythe  Avery,  who  had  just  conquered  his  pique  over  his  rejection 
last  January.)  That  her  one  confidant's  honorable  silence  ex 
pressed  his  trust  that  she  herself  would  "tell"  was  possibly  true; 
but  that,  in  this  no-quarter  conflict  between  them,  was  merely  so 
much  the  worse  for  him.  She  would  not  think  of  him  at  all. 
She  had  run  away  from  him  every  time  she  had  seen  him ;  now 
she  had  but  to  do  it  once  more,  and  all  would  be  as  if  it  had  never 
been. .  .  . 

At  the  Sabbath  dinner-table,  which  was  to-day  uninvaded  by 
guests,  the  Heths'  talk  was  animated.  The  imminent  separation 
brought  a  certain  softness  into  the  family  atmosphere;  papa 
basked  in  it.  He  had  spent  his  Sunday  morning  playing  sixteen 
holes  of  golf  at  the  Country  Club,  and  would  have  easily  made 
the  full  round  but  for  slicing  three  new  balls  into  the  pond  on  the 
annoying  seventeenth  drive.  This  had  provoked  him  into  smash 
ing  his  driver,  as  he  had  a  score  of  only  eighty-eight  at  that  point, 
which  was  well  below  his  personal  bogey.  Even  mamma  affected 
interest  in  her  spouse's  explanations  of  how  it  all  happened. 

"Of  course  the  caddy  simply  slipped  the  balls  in  his  pockets 
the  minute  your  back  was  turned — they  're  all  thieves,  the  little 
ragamuffins,"  said  she.  "And,  by  the  way,  I  have  n't  telephoned 
the  bank  about  the  silver." 

Encouraged  by  his  ladies'  consideration,  Mr.  Heth  proposed 
a  little  afternoon  jaunt  with  Cally. 

"It's  too  pretty  a  day  to  stay  in,"  said  he.  "Let's  take  the 
car,  eh,  and  run  down  and  look  at  that  new  cantilever  bridge 
at  Apsworth?" 

"Oh,  papa!"  said  Cally,  regretfully.  "I  promised  Mr.  Avery 
I  'd  take  a  walk  with  him.  He  looked  so  fat  and  forlorn  I  did  n't 
have  the  heart  to  refuse.  I'm  so  sorry." 

Mr.  Heth  started  to  quote  something  about  your  daughter's 
being  your  daughter,  but  when  Cally  added,  "You  know  I'd 
lots  rather  go  with  you,  papa,"  he  changed  his  mind,  and  went 
off  to  his  nap  instead. 

Mamma  similarly  departed.  Cally,  not  feeling  nappy,  sat  in 

242 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

the  library  and  wrote  to  her  lover  the  last  letter  but  one  she  would 
write  before  seeing  him  in  New  York.  Her  eager  pen  flew:  but 
so  did  the  minutes  also,  or  did  the  impetuous  Avery  anticipate 
the  moment  of  his  engagement?  His  tender  ring  broke  unexpect 
edly  across  her  betrothal  thoughts,  and  Cally  returned  to  earth 
with  a  start  .  .  .  Good  heavens!  Four  o'clock  already! — and  she 
with  twenty  minutes'  getting  ready  to  do ! 

She  caught  up  the  pages  of  the  unfinished  letter,  and  skipped 
for  the  stairs.  In  the  hall  there  was  unbroken  quiet,  with  no  sound 
of  a  servant  coming.  Cally  paused,  listening,  and  then  remem 
bered  that  it  was  Sunday  afternoon,  when  even  the  best  Africans 
are  so  very  likely  to  have  "just  stepped  out."  Why  wait?  The 
girl  went  and  opened  the  door  herself,  a  smile  of  greeting  in  her 
eye,  a  lively  apology  for  her  obvious  unreadiness  upon  her  lip. 

However,  it  was  not,  after  all,  the  amorous  Mr.  Avery  who 
confronted  her.  The  vestibule  held  only  an  ill-dressed  young  girl, 
in  a  gaudy  red  hat,  the  sort  of  looking  person  who  should  at  most 
have  rung  the  basement  bell,  if  that:  and  she  herself  seemed  to 
realize  this  by  the  guilty  little  start  and  tremble  she  gave  when 
the  stately  door  swung  open  upon  her.  The  young  mistress  of  the 
house  eyed  her  doubtfully. 

"Good  afternoon." 

"G-good  evenin',  ma'am!  .  .  ." 

As  she  seemed  at  a  loss  how  to  proceed,  Carlisle  said:  "Yes? 
What  is  it?" 

The  young  person  raised  a  bare  hand  and  brushed  it,  with  a 
strange  gesture,  before  her  eyes. 

"Dr.  Vivian  he  told  me  to  give  you  this  note,  ma'am." 

She  added,  as  if  suddenly  moved  to  destroy  a  possible  impres 
sion  of  Dr.  Vivian  as  a  slave-driver,  flinging  orders  this  way  and 
that: 

"He'd  of  brung  it  himself,  on'y  I  was  going  walkin'  myself, 
ma'am,  and  asked  him  to  leave  me  take  it." 

If  the  fall  was  from  the  height  of  the  securest  moment  Car 
lisle  had  known  since  her  self-betrayal,  the  more  stunning  was 
the  impact.  Her  heart  appeared  to  abdicate  its  duties,  with  one 
kick;  all  her  being  drew  together  in  a  knot  within  her.  It 

243 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


had  come,  after  all.  To  run  away  was  well,  but  she  had  not  run 
soon  enough.  .  .  . 

She  received  the  note  mechanically,  saying:  "Very  well." 

"  Would  you  wish  me  to  wait  for  a  nanser,  ma'am?  Doctor  he 
did  n't  say  .  .  ," 

In  heaven  or  earth,  what  answer  would  she  find  to  this? 

"No,  you  need  n't  wait." 

"Do  you  feel  faint,  ma'am?" 

"Faint?  ...  No,  why  should  I?" 

The  young  person,  convicted  of  impertinence  and  silliness 
besides,  turned  retf,  but  would  not  remove  her  gaze  from  the  lady's 
face. 

11  The  —  the  heat  we  been'^havin',  ma'am.  I  don't  know  —  it 's 
so  sickenin',  kind  of.  I  —  I  fainted  last  week,  twice,  ma'am." 

Something  nameless  in  the  little  creature's  wide-eyed  gaze, 
timid  and  yet  thrilled,  arrested  Carlisle  in  the  act  of  shutting 
the  door  upon  her.  Was  it  possible  that  this  singular  messenger 
of  Fate  had  knowledge  of  the  message  she  brought? 

"Why  do  you  stare  at  me  so?" 

The  girl  replied  with  simplicity: 

"I  can't  help  it,  ma'am,  you  look  so  sweet." 

Carlisle  leaned  against  the  polished  edge  of  the  glass  and  oak 
door.  The  same  chill  little  hand  clenched  the  unfinished  pages  to 
Hugo,  and  Vivian's  only  too  fatally  finished  note.  She  perceived 
who  this  girl  must  be,  and  even  in  this  moment  her  thought  was 
riveted  by  the  wild  suspicion  that  her  secret  had  already  been 
betrayed. 

"You  live  at  the  Dabney  House,  I  suppose?  —  you're  a 
buncher  at  the  Works?  .  .  .  How  did  you  know  me  —  that  this 
note  was  for  me?" 

Here  was  a  puzzler,  indeed.  By  what  instinct  had  little  Kern 
known,  the  instant  the  door  began  to  open,  that  this,  and  no  other, 
was  Mr.  V.  V.'s  beautiful  lady?  .  .  . 

" How  could  you  be  anybody  else,  ma'am?  .  .  .  You  could  n't." 

"I  believe  I  have  heard  Dr.  Vivian  speak  of  you.  Possibly," 
she  said,  with  stony  bitterness,  "  you  have  heard  of  me  in  the  same 


way? 


244 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

The  girl  seemed  to  shrink  a  little  at  her  tone.  "Oh,  ma'am  — 
no!  To  me!  No,  ma'am!  He  would  n't .  .  ." 

"But  he  is  a  great  friend  of  yours?" 

Kern  raised  a  hand  to  her  heart,  understanding  only  too  much 
that  was  not  so.  It  was  a  glorious  moment  for  her,  and  a  terrible 
one. 

"No,  ma'am,"  said  she,  shaking  her  head  a  number  of  times. 
"I'm  only  his  charity  sick." 

She  added,  as  if  to  make  the  repudiation  complete:  "Mr. 
V.  V.'s  friends  are  ladies,  ma'am." 

"Mr.  V.  V.?" 

Confronted  by  her  damning  slip,  the  young  person  turned  scar 
let,  but  she  stood  her  ground  with  a  little  gasp. 

"A  nickname,  ma'am,  that  all  his  sick  call  him  by'. .  .  ." 

A  fair  enough  rally,  no  doubt,  but  on  the  whole  it  accomplished 
nothing.  Just  in  the  middle  of  it,  the  lady  had  shut  the  door  in 
the  small  vulgarian's  face. 

Carlisle  clutched  the  two  letters  to  her  breast.  The  door 
having  been  shut,  she  was  alone  in  the  world.  She  went  up 
two  flights  in  the  Sunday  afternoon  stillness,  and  locked  her 
self  in  her  room.  Mamma  should  not  enter  here  on  her  gliding 
heels. 

So  this,  after  all,  was  what  he  meant  by  "seeing."  Having 
decoyed  her  with  false  hopes  for  five  days,  he  struck  from  ambush, 
giving  her  no  chance  to  speak  for  herself.  Well,  she  would  be 
hard,  too.  She  would  make  no  answer,  and  when  he  spoke,  she 
would  deny  .  „>* 

That  the  worst  had  now  come  to  the  worst,  she  had  not  enter 
tained  a  doubt.  Accordingly  the  emotional  revulsion  was  strong 
when,  breaking  open  the  envelope  with  cold  fingers,  Carlisle 
found  that  the  letter  within  was  in  a  different  handwriting  from 
the  superscription.  It  was  not  from  Dr.  Vivian  at  all. 

However,  her  instant  uprush  of  relief  was  somewhat  miti 
gated  when  she  saw  —  as  she  did  in  the  first  glance,  for  this 
hand  had  been  not  unfamiliar  to  her  once  —  that  the  letter 
Vivian  enclosed  to  her  was  from  Jack  Dalhousie. 

Standing  rigid  by  the  window,  she  read  with  parted  lips; 

245 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


WEYMOUTH,  May  i4th. 
DEAR  V.  V. : 

I  'd  have  answered  your  letter  earlier  only  I  have  n't  had 
any  heart  for  writing  letters.  Fate  has  knocked  me  out  again. 
God  knows  I  Ve  tried,  and  cut  out  the  drink,  and  worked 
hard,  and  suffered  agonies  of  the  damned,  but  it  does  n't  do 
any  good.  The  world  is  n't  big  enough  for  people  like  me  to 
hide  in,  and  the  only  thing  I  can't  understand  is  why  people 
like  me  are  ever  born.  What's  the  use  of  it  all,  V.  V.,  I  can't 
see  to  save  my  life.  The  trouble  all  came  from  a  fellow 
named  Bellows,  from  home,  a  machinery  salesman  with  T.  B. 
Wicke  Sons,  you  may  know  him,  who  dropped  off  the  train 
here  a  week  ago  Saturday. 

He  saw  me  on  the  street  one  day,  and  then  he  went  and  told 
everybody  that  I  was  in  Texas  because  I'd  been  drummed 
from  home.  Said  I  went  out  rowing  with  a  girl  and  upset  her 
and  then  swam  off  for  my  skin  and  she  was  nearly  drowned. 
I've  made  some  good  friends  here  —  or  had  made  them,  I  'd 
better  say  —  and  one  of  them  rode  out  to  our  place  and  said 
I  ought  to  know  what  Bellows  was  saying,  so  I  could  thrash 
him  before  he  skipped  town.  Oh,  what  could  I  say. 

Then  I  saw  Miss  Taylor  just  now,  she's  the  girl  from  the 
East  I  mentioned  in  the  winter,  and  she  asked  me  had  I  heard 
what  they  were  saying.  I  wanted  to  lie  to  her,  and  she  'd  have 
believed  me  if  I  had,  but  you  could  n't  lie  to  her,  and  so  I  said 
straight  out  I  was  crazy  drunk  at  the  time  and  did  n't  know 
what  I  was  doing,  but  I  guessed  most  of  it  was  true.  She  cares 
a  lot  about  those  things,  and  I  think  she  'd  been  crying.  God 
help  me.  So  now  everything 's  changed  here;  it  reminds  me  of 
home  the  way  people  look  at  me.  Miss  Taylor  was  the  worst, 
she's  been  so  fine  to  me.  She  said  come  to  see  her  in  two  or 
three  days,  when  she  'd  had  time  to  think,  and  if  she  casts  me 
off,  I  can't  stand  it  here  any  longer,  and  I  don't  see  how  I  can 
begin  all  over  again,  just  when  life  was  seeming  as  if  it  might 
be  worth  while  again. 

So  now,  you  see,  V.  V.,  why  I  was  n't  prompter  answering 
your  letter.  I  Ve  tried  to  keep  my  courage  up  like  you  ad 
vised,  but  it 's  too  much  for  one  man  to  carry.  May  you  never 
know  the  awful  feeling  that  you're  an  outcast,  not  wanted 
anywhere,  is  the  wish  of 

Your  unhappy  friend,         DAL. 
246 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


P.  S.  How  's  father,  do  you  ever  see  him  these  days? 
Don't  let  him  know  any  of  this. 

The  girl  looked  through  the  rose-flowered  curtains  down  into 
the  sunny  street.  .  .  . 

Dalhousie  had  long  since  become  but  a  shadow  and  a  name  to 
Cally;  she  had  willed  it  so,  and  so  it  had  been.  Now,  in  his  own 
poor  scrawl,  the  ghost  of  a  lover  too  roughly  discarded  rose  and 
walked  again.  And  beneath  the  cheap  writing  and  the  unre 
strained  self-pity,  she  seemed  to  plumb  for  the  first  time  the 
depths  of  the  boy's  present  misery.  The  old  story,  having  struck 
him  down  once,  had  hunted  him  out  and  struck  him  down 
again.  Where  now  would  he  hide  ?  .  .  . 

The  too  reminiscent  letter  had  come  with  the  inopportunity 
of  destiny.  A  little  more  pressure  and  she  was  done  for. 

But  this  was  mere  mad  folly.  To  shake  it  off  at  once,  Cally 
began  to  walk  about  her  bedchamber.  Nothing  had  really  hap 
pened  that  had  not  been  true  all  along.  She  wished  more  than 
ever  that  it  had  all  been  started  differently,  but  it  was  too  late  to 
consider  that  now.  She  must  think  of  herself,  and  of  Hugo  and 
mamma.  Dalhousie's  friend  had  done  his  worst,  and  she  could 
still  withstand  it.  Once  in  New  York,  once  in  Europe,  and  all 
would  be  as  it  had  been  before.  .  .  . 

Nevertheless,  she  was  presently  weak  enough  to  open  the 
letter  again.  Now  her  eye  fell  upon  two  lines  written  in  the 
margin  at  the  top  of  the  first  page,  which  she  had  missed  before. 
They  were  in  the  writing  of  the  envelope,  and  read: 

You  can  reach  me  at  any  time,  day  or  night,  through 
Meeghan's  Grocery  —  Jefferson  4127. 

The  words  sprang  up  at  her,  and  she  stared  back  at  them  fas 
cinated.  The  man  at  the  Dabney  House  was  certain  that  she 
would  tell  now.  He  thought  the  resolution  might  come  on  her 
suddenly,  as  in  the  night.  Nominally,  he  left  it  to  her;  yet  at  the 
same  time  he  contrived  to  make  her  feel  caught  in  a  trap,  with 
no  alternative,  with  this  sense  of  enormous  pressure  upon  her. 

247 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


She  remembered  the  man's  strange,  stern  words  to  her:  "You 
can't  be  happy  now,  till  you  let  the  truth  be  known." 

All  at  once  it  seemed  almost  as  if  there  were  some  one  in  the 
room  with  her.  She  looked  around  hastily:  but  of  course  there 
was  no  one.  She  became  very  much  frightened.  .  .  . 

There  came  a  knock  on  the  door,  and  a  voice: 

"Genaman  in  the  parlor  to  see  you,  Miss  Cyahlile.  Mist' 
Avery." 

"I  can't  come  down." 

"Ma'am?" 

"Say  I'm  not  well  and  am  lying  down." 

In  the  hall  below,  the  parlormaid  Annie  encountered  Mrs. 
Heth,  waked  from  her  nap  by  the  two  rings  at  the  bell.  Mrs. 
Heth  ascended  to  Carlisle's  room  and  rattled  the  knob. 

"Cally?  .  .  .  Why,  your  door's  locked!" 

The  door  opened,  and  Carlisle  confronted  her  mother  with  a 
white  tremulous  face. 

"What's  the  matter?"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  gliding  in  with  an  ex 
pression  of  maternal  solicitude.  "Annie  said  you  weren't  well 
and  were  lying  down." 

"I'm  not  well  .  .  .  Mamma,  let's  go  to  New  York  to-mor 
row." 

"Go  to-morrow!  .  .  .  Why,  what's  the  matter?" 

"Nothing.  Only  I  —  I'm  so  tired  of  being  at  home." 

Then  her  strained  stiffness  broke  abruptly,  and  she  flung  her 
arms  around  her  mother's  neck  with  an  hysterical  abandon  by  no 
means  characteristic. 

"Oh,  I  can't  stand  it  here  another  day.  7  can't!  Please, 
please,  mamma!  It  must  be  not  having  Hugo.  I  can't  explain  — 
it 's  just  the  way  I  feel.  I  'm  so  miserable  here,  I  could  die. 
Please,  mamma!  .  .  ." 

Mrs.  Heth,  detecting  with  alarm  the  incipiences  of  a  dangerous 
flare-up,  said  with  startling  gentleness: 

"There,  there,  dear!  Mamma  will  arrange  it  as  you  wish." 


XIX 

How  it  is  One  Thing  to  run  away  from  yourself,  and  another  to 
escape;  how  Colly  orders  the  Best  Cocktails,  and  gazes  at  her 
Mother  asleep;  also  of  Jefferson  4127,  and  why  Mamma  left  the 
Table  in  a  hurry  at  the  Cafe  des  Ambassadeurs. 

MAMMA  arranged  it,  by  Amazonian  effort.   New  York, 
the  colossal,  received  the  runaway  with  an  anonymous 
roar,  asking  no  questions.  Here,  in  the  late  afternoon 
of  the  first  day,  safe  forever  in  a  well-furnished  room  on  a  seven 
teenth  floor,  Cally  Heth  made  her  answer  to  Dalhousie's  letter. 
She  formally  cremated  the  scrawl  in  a  pink  saucer  which  had 
previously  been  doing  nothing  more  useful  in  the  world  than 
holding  up  a  toothbrush  mug. 

The  cremation  was  a  rite  in  its  way,  yet  required  only  the 
saucer  and  two  matches.  The  letter,  when  well  torn,  flamed 
nicely,  only  a  few  scraps  holding  out  against  immediate  combus 
tion.  There  was  one  little  fragment  on  top,  observable  from  the 
beginning;  it  read: 

or  night 

fferson  4127 

These  topmost  bits  refused  to  respond  to  poking  with  the 
burnt  match,  and  finally  demanded  a  new  match  all  to  them 
selves.  Within  two  minutes  all  were  reduced  to  fine  ashes,  which 
the  priestess  of  the  rite  duly  took  to  the  window,  and  scattered 
down  into  the  "court."  Then  she  washed  her  hands,  put  the 
saucer  back  under  the  mug,  and  raised  another  window  to  let  out 
the  smell. 

This  business  completed,  Carlisle  glanced  at  her  watch.  It 
was  ten  minutes  past  six,  or  nearly  time  to  begin  to  dress.  The 
moment  was  an  interlude  in  a  day  which  had  been  full  of  exciting 
activity,  keyed  with  the  joy  of  journey's  end  and  lovers'  meeting. 
An  evening  in  similar  titillating  vein  waited  just  ahead.  At  this 

249 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

moment,  Canning,  bidden  au  revoir  some  ten  minutes  ago,  was 
doubtless  dressing  at  his  club,  seven  blocks  away.  Mrs.  Heth, 
left  to  her  own  resources  all  afternoon,  had  fallen  asleep  in  her 
chair,  and  still  slept.  Even  the  maid  Flora  was  absent,  having 
been  given  the  afternoon  off,  after  unpacking  two  trunks,  to  "  git 
to  see  "  her  uncle,  a  personage  of  authority  who  served  his  coun 
try  well  by  sorting  letters  in  the  New  York  Post-Office. 

Alone  in  the  hotel  bedroom,  Carlisle  looked  in  the  mirror  of  the 
mahoganized  "  dresser,"  occupied  in  taking  off  her  veil  and  hat, 
and  thought  that  Flora  ought  to  be  coming  back  now.  Then  she 
sniffed  a  little  and  was  aware  of  a  memorial  smell  from  the  rite. 
After  that  her  mind  appeared  to  float  away  for  a  time,  and 
when  she  caught  up  with  it  again,  it  was  thinking: 

Nothing  so  much  could  really  have  happened,  if  I  had  told. 

It  was  an  academic  thought  for  a  mind  which  must  have  known 
very  well  that  everything  was  settled  now.  Carlisle,  assuming 
charge  herself,  promptly  turned  it  out.  Having  put  her  hat  on 
the  bed,  she  began  to  busy  herself  with  preparations  for  the  even 
ing.  Flora  lingering  at  her  avuncular  pleasures,  she  herself  went 
to  the  closet  and  took  down  a  dress.  A  capable  girl  she  was,  who 
could  easily  get  out  her  own  clothes  when  absolutely  necessary. 

Canning  was  dining  the  two  ladies  at  the  resplendent  estab 
lishment  of  his  choice,  at  seven-thirty  o'clock;  he  was  due  to  re 
turn  in  an  hour  now.  All  day  he  had  been  in  attendance,  and  all 
day  he  had  been  the  very  prince  of  lovers.  Having  lunched  with 
Mrs.  Heth  and  Carlisle  at  their  hotel,  he  and  his  betrothed  had 
spent  the  whole  afternoon  together  jogging  about  the  Maytime 
park  in  a  hansom-cab,  —  such  was  her  whim,  —  with  late  tea  at 
the  Inn  of  renown  upon  the  Drive:  and  through  all,  such  talk  as 
sped  the  hours  on  wings.  How  fascinating  he  was,  she  seemed  to 
have  forgotten,  in  these  days  of  absence  and  worry.  And  how 
strong  and  all-conquering !  —  a  man  of  such  natural  lordliness  of 
mien  that  cabmen  and  policemen,  proud  men  and  strangers  as 
they  were,  spoke  to  him  with  something  akin  to  respect. 

Yes,  Hugo  was,  indeed,  a  rock  and  tower  of  strength.  With 
him  behind  her,  she  had  the  world  at  her  feet.  .  .  .  Heavens!  What 
could  gossip  possibly  do  to  Mrs.  Hugo  Canning? 

250 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Outside  was  the  roar  of  conglomerate  humanity.  Up  here  in 
this  strange  bedroom,  indifferent  host  to  a  thousand  transient 
souls,  it  was  quiet  and  even  a  little  lonely.  Once  more  Carlisle 
caught  her  mind  at  its  retrospective  misbehavior,  and  once  more 
turned  the  key  on  it.  Having  laid  out  her  dress  on  the  bed,  she 
stood  and  looked  down  into  the  cheerless  light-well  a  minute, 
and  then  decided  to  wake  up  her  mother.  But  she  stopped  on  the 
way  and  turned  back.  Why  wake  up  mamma  half  an  hour  too 
soon,  just  to  hear  the  sound  of  one's  own  voice? 

She  took  off  her  watch,  and  raised  her  hands  to  begin  unfasten 
ing  her  waist.  But  she  became  engrossed  in  staring  back  at  her 
reflection  in  the  mirror,  and  presently  her  hands  dropped. 

Face  and  form,  background  and  destiny,  she  was  possessed  of 
blessings  many  and  obvious :  all  crowned  now,  sealed  and  stamped, 
with  the  love  of  Hugo  Canning,  which,  he  had  pledged  himself, 
was  a  love  which  should  not  die.  What  girl  so  entirely  success 
ful  as  she?  Convincingly  the  excellent  glass  gave  back  the  pre 
sentment  of  loveliness  endowed  with  all  the  gifts  of  Fortune. 

And  yet  she  had  run  away:  there  was  no  evading  that.  An 
insignificant  boy  thousands  of  miles  away  had  sent  out  a  cry  for 
help,  and  she,  the  proud  and  blessed,  who  had  always  considered 
herself  quite  as  spunky  as  another  person,  had  bolted  in  a  panic. 
And  she  had  bolted  too  fast,  it  seemed,  to  consider  even  that, 
with  that  cry,  there  had  come  a  new  element  into  the  situation, 
disturbing  to  the  old  argument.  The  full  reach  and  meaning  of 
Jack  Dalhousie's  letter  seemed  to  be  coming  upon  her  now  for  the 
first  time,  just  when  she  had  ritually  cremated  it.  Out  of  the 
pink  saucer  had  mysteriously  blown  the  knowledge  that  the 
author  of  that  poor  composition  could  no  more  be  pictured  as 
doing  splendidly  down  in  Texas.  .  .  . 

For  a  third  time  her  over-mind  spied  upon  and  detected  the 
nether's  treason;  and  this  time  Cally,  turning  abruptly  from 
the  mirror,  was  troubled.  Having  run  away,  could  she  not  at 
least  enjoy  a  runaway's  peace?  Why  backward  glances  now? 
She  had  escaped  Dalhousie.  She  had  escaped  Dalhousie's  friend. 
She  stood  in  this  room  the  safest  person  in  the  world.  No  one  on 
earth  could  betray  her  except  herself. 

251 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

The  watch  ticked  loud,  steadily  drawing  Hugo,  and  mamma 
and  Flora.  Up  through  the  windows  came  the  twilight  and  the 
rumble  of  the  vast  heedless  city.  Carlisle  snapped  on  the  lights. 
And  then  all  at  once,  without  warning,  there  closed  down  upon 
her  an  enormous  depression,  a  sense  as  of  standing  on  the  brink 
of  irretrievable  disaster.  Or  it  was  as  if  she  had  run  away,  indeed, 
but  had  not  escaped.  Or  as  if,  in  cutting  herself  off  from  the 
past,  she  had  cut  away  something  important,  which  something 
here  gave  notice  that  it  would  not  be  peacefully  abandoned.  And 
mixed  with  this  there  was  again  that  sense  of  large  pressure  upon 
her,  so  tangible  that  it  was  almost  like  a  person  in  the  room  with 
her,  sharing,  dominating  her  councils.  .  .  . 

She  was  far  from  understanding  these  feelings,  but  she  did 
understand  that  she  felt  suddenly  sickish  and  quite  faint;  and  she 
thought  practically  of  mamma's  little  flask  of  brandy  in  her  bag 
somewhere,  if  only  she  could  find  it.  Then  speculations  on  this 
point  vanished  with  the  recollection  that  she  stood  in  the  modern 
Arabian  Nights,  all  the  resources  of  the  world  at  her  beck. 

Cally  stepped  to  the  telephone  and  called  down  in  a  small  but 
authoritative  voice: 

"Send  me  up  a  cocktail  at  once,  please.  Room  1704." 

"Yes,  mum,"  replied  the  experienced  voice  far  below. 
"What  kind  would  you  wish?" 

"Oh  ...  the  best,"  said  she,  less  authoritatively;  and  then 
rang  off  hurriedly,  thinking  how  funny  it  was  that  she  couldn't 
produce  the  name  of  a  cocktail  when  needed,  since  papa  shook 
one  up  for  himself  nearly  every  evening,  and  Hugo  always  ordered 
them  when  they  dined  together,  and  laughed  at  the  little  faces 
she  made.  .  .  . 

The  cocktail  came,  on  rubber  heels,  and  she  sipped  it,  walking 
about  the  room  and  not  thinking  at  all  about  dressing.  A  spoon 
ful  or  so  of  the  yellow  concoction,  and  the  sickish  feeling  van 
ished,  and  she  felt  instead  rather  devilish  and  fast,  like  the 
blondined  villainess  in  a  play.  She  was  a  daring  woman  of  the 
new  school,  a  Woman  with  a  Past,  who  rang  up  hotel  bars  and 
ordered  the  best  cocktails  sent  up  at  once.  .  .  . 

Possibly  the  cocktail  had  this  moral  reaction,  that  she  no 

252 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


longer  sought  to  discipline  her  mind.  She  sipped  the  drink  gin 
gerly,  and  her  thought  fluttered  backward  and  forward,  full  of 
contradictions  and  repetitions,  as  thought  is  in  life,  but  now 
free.  .  .  .  Suppose,  after  all,  that  her  past  was  not  escaped?  It 
was  n't  such  an  easy  thing  to  do,  it  seemed.  Dalhousie  thought 
he  had  escaped  his,  but  it  had  run  him  down  at  last,  way  off  in 
Texas.  Suppose  Dr.  Vivian  now  decided  (in  view  of  her  being 
a  fugitive)  that  it  was  his  duty  to  lay  the  matter  before  Colonel 
Dalhousie,  and  the  tempestuous  Colonel  took  the  next  train.  .  .  . 

There  was  a  knock  at  the  door,  causing  her  to  start  violently, 
and  spill  some  of  the  cocktail.  However,  it  was  not  Colonel  Dal 
housie,  but  only  the  maid  Flora,  who  entered  with  that  air  of 
eager  hurry  so  characteristic  of  an  habitually  tardy  race.  It 
appeared  that  the  infernal  powers  had  conspired  against  her 
promptitude  in  the  shape  of  a  blockade,  not  to  mention  losting 
her  way  through  the  malicious  misdirection  of  a  white  man 
selling  little  men  that  danced  on  a  string.  .  .  . 

Having  learned  further  that  the  postal  uncle  was  poly  las' 
month  but  tollable  now,  Flora's  young  mistress  said: 

"We  must  dress  in  a  hurry  now,  Flora.  It's  quarter  to 
seven." 

And  then  she  went  on  through  to  the  sitting-room  of  the  suite, 
to  wake  her  mother,  thinking:  "I  can't  go  on  this  way  the  rest  of 
my  life,  jumping  out  of  my  skin  every  time  there 's  a  knock.  .  .  . 
What  on  earth  have  I  been  so  afraid  of?  ..." 

Mrs.  Heth  slept  on  in  her  deep-bosomed  chair,  undisturbed  by 
the  click  of  switch  or  burst  of  light  into  her  enveloping  dusk.  She 
had  a  magazine,  face  downward,  in  her  lap ;  also  a  one-pound  box 
of  mixed  chocolates,  open.  Her  head  had  fallen  upon  her  chair- 
back;  a  position  which  brought  the  strange  dark  little  mustache 
into  prominence,  and  also  threw  into  relief  the  unexpected  heavi 
ness  of  the  jaw  and  neck.  The  face  of  an  indomitable  creature, 
certainly,  of  one  of  those  fittest  to  survive;  but  not  exactly  a 
spiritual  face,  perhaps,  hardly  a  face  finely  sensitive  to  immaterial 
values.  .  .  . 

To  gaze  at  a  person  who  is  unaware  of  being  watched  may  be 
worse  than  eavesdropping.  Arrested  in  the  act  of  waking  her 

253 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

mother,  Carlisle  stood  for  some  moments  looking  down  at  her. 
What  was  there  lacking  in  mamma  that  you  could  n't  ever  talk 
things  over  with  her?  Upon  the  unconscious  face  it  was  plainly 
inscribed  that  this  lady  would  stand  against  telling  to  the 
last  ditch.  Somehow  the  knowledge  brought  the  daughter  no 
comfort.  .  .  . 

And  now  that  she  stopped  to  consider  in  calm  security,  what, 
really,  if  she  did  send  Vivian  a  little  note  just  before  she  sailed, 
authorizing  him  to  tell?  What  had  she,  of  all  people,  to  fear  from 
the  clacking  tattle  of  a  few  old  cats?  Suppose,  to-morrow,  she 
calmly  said  to  Hugo  and  mamma,  "I've  felt  all  along  that  I  did 
him  an  injustice,  and  now  that  I  know  he 's  so  unhappy,  I  want  to 
set  it  straight."  What,  really,  could  they  say  that  would  be  so 
bad?  If  there  was  a  price  for  telling,  it  appeared  now  that  there 
was  a  price  also  for  not  telling. 

Minutes  passed  .  .  . 

And  then  at  the  shake,  Mrs.  Heth  stirred,  turned,  rolled  a 
little,  and  opened  her  eyes  with  a  start  and  a  blink. 

"I  must  have  dropped  asleep,"  said  she. 

"  No ! "  said  Cally ;  and  she  gave  a  sudden  gay  burst  of  laughter. 

"I  don't  see  anything  so  funny  in  that,"  said  Mrs.  Heth, 
yawning  and  sitting  up.  "What  time  is  it?" 

"  I  think  it 's  a  perfect  scream,  and  it 's  nearly  seven,  and  Hugo 
will  be  here  at  quarter  past,  punctually.  Now  will  you  fly?" 

"  You  might  have  waked  me  a  little  earlier.  Good  gracious ! . . . 
How  long  have  you  been  in?  Anything  happen  while  I  napped?  " 

" Not  a  single,  solitary,  blessed  thing.  .  .  .  There  you  are!  — 
Easy  does  it!" 

"I'll  be  dressed  long  before  you  are  now,"  was  the  maternal 
retort,  accompanied  by  a  long  stretch. 

And,  though  unchallenged,  she  was  as  good  as  her  word. 
Highly  efficient  at  the  toilet  as  elsewhere,  she  required  small 
assistance  from  Flora,  whom  she  cfispatched  to  tidy  up  the  sit 
ting-room  instead.  The  good  little  lady  was  armed  cap-a-pie  by 
seven-fifteen,  at  which  time  a  glance  into  Carlisle's  room  re 
vealed  much  backwardness  there,  not  concealed  by  the  appear 
ances  of  haste.  Hugo  would  have  to  wait,  that  was  clear;  and 

254 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

just  as  it  was  clear,  up  Mr.  Canning's  name  came  skipping  from 
the  office. 

In  the  tidied-up  sitting-room  Mrs.  Heth  entertained  her  dis 
tinguished  son-to-be,  during  the  little  delay.  She  always  enjoyed 
a  good  talk  with  Hugo.  He  was  her  pledge  of  a  well-spent  life,  her 
Order  of  Merit,  her  V.  C.  and  Star  and  Garter,  rolled  together  in 
a  single  godlike  figure.  She  beamed  upon  him,  tugging  at  white 
gloves  half  a  size  too  small.  Canning  tapped  a  well-shod  foot 
with  his  walking-stick,  and  wished  for  his  love. 

The  wish  grew  by  what  it  fed  on,  and  the  banquet  ran  long. 
Half  an  hour  passed  before  the  door  from  Mrs.  Heth's  bedroom 
opened  and  Carlisle  appeared.  However,  she  looked  worth  wait 
ing  for.  She  shimmered  a  moment  from  the  threshold,  and  the 
two  in  the  sitting-room  thought  together  that  they  had  never 
seen  her  so  radiantly  lovely. 

"I  made  her!"  thought  Mrs.  Heth. 

"Mine!"  thought  Canning. 

And  Cally  thought,  her  eyes  upon  her  lover:  " Me  afraid!  .  .  ." 

"My  dear  Cally!  Really,  I  can  say  nothing  for  you  but  better 
late  than  never,"  said  mamma. 

"  Salutations ! "  said  Hugo,  rising.  "  And  by  Jove !  What  a  per 
fectly  stunning  dress!" 

"Oh,  do  you  like  it?"  said  Carlisle,  trailing  forward,  her  eyes 
shining.  "Then  you  won't  scold,  will  you,  if  my  watch  was  a 
trifle  slow!  And  I  should  have  been  ready  hours  ago,  even  at 
that,  but  for  Flora's  over-staying  at  her  uncle's.  Tell  Mr.  Can 
ning,  Flora,  was  n't  it  all  your  fault?" 

And  Flora,  having  followed  her  young  mistress  in  with  the  car 
riage-cloak,  giggled  into  her  hand  as  at  a  royal  jest  and  said 
yas  'm,  it  certny  was.  .  .  . 

In  holiday  vein  the  trio  departed  from  the  suite,  dropped  six 
teen  stories  in  the  lift,  and  presently  came  by  taxicab  to  the 
Cafe  des  Ambassadeurs,  where  had  taken  place  the  memorable 
dinner  for  two,  just  two  months  ago  to  a  night.  .  .  . 

Here  all  was  glittering  and  gay.  The  Ambassadeurs,  pending 
the  arrival  of  something  newer,  was  on  the  pinnacle  of  expensive 
popularity.  At  this  hour  everything  was  in  fullest  swing,  and  the 

255 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

impressive  looking  major-domo  was  shaking  his  head  without 
hope  to  arriving  applicants  who  had  not  ordered  a  table  before 
hand,  as  Hugo  had  done  by  messenger. 

The  Heth  ladies  turned  into  the  cloak-room  to  remove  their 
wraps.  The  air  of  vivacity  pervading  the  place,  or  possibly  it  was 
her  daughter's  staccato  liveliness,  entered  the  blood  of  Mrs. 
Heth:  she  was  imperious  with  the  ladies'  maid  who  assisted 
with  the  unwrapping.  Carlisle,  strolling  about  as  she  unbut 
toned  her  gloves,  came  to  the  elaborate  screen  which  sheltered 
the  doorway  and  glanced  out.  Directly  opposite,  over  the  bril 
liant  corridor,  her  gaze  fell  upon  the  glass  and  yellow-wood  of  a 
long-distance  telephone  booth. 

Then  she  caught  sight  of  Hugo,  and  smiled  at  him,  and  at  the 
same  moment  mamma's  voice  said  at  her  elbow: 

"There's  Hugo,  waiting.  .  .  .  Are  you  ready?  " 

"And  waiting,  too,"  said  Carlisle. 

They  emerged  from  the  ladies'  bower  into  the  stir  of  the  ante 
chamber.  Met  halfway  by  their  escort,  they  proceeded  toward  the 
dining-room.  Advance  was  a  little  slow;  there  was  some  confu 
sion  here  and  even  crowding,  replete  diners  blocking  the  way  of 
those  just  going  in.  Just  at  the  door,  a  party  of  five  or  six  man 
aged  to  come  between  Carlisle  and  Canning,  who  was  dutifully 
looking  out  for  his  future  mother-in-law;  the  girl  became  mo 
mentarily  separated  from  her  protectors.  Or  perhaps  it  was 
partly  Cally's  own  fault,  precipitated  by  the  sight  of  a  page 
standing  near,  who  certainly  seemed  to  have  been  stationed  there 
by  the  hand  of  Providence.  .  .  . 

Having  stared  fascinated  at  this  page  for  half  a  second, 
Carlisle  brought  him  to  her  side  by  a  nod.  The  lad  was  fifteen 
and  had  seen  lovely  ladies  in  his  time,  but  raising  his  eyes  to  this 
one,  he  acknowledged  that  she  was  a  Queen. 

"Call  long  distance  for  me,  boy.  ...  I'll  write  the  num 
ber." 

The  boy  produced  pad  and  pencil,  and  she  scribbled  rapidly, 
a  smile  hovering  over  the  sweet  mouth  whose  slight  irregularity 
charmed  the  eye  beyond  flawlessness. 

Why,  indeed,  wait  longer,  running  and  sticking  one's  head  in 

256 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

the  sand,  when  here  was  the  telephone,  immediate  and  conclu 
sive,  when  she  felt  now  so  brave  and  sure,  and  could  tell  mamma 
and  Hugo  this  very  night  without  a  tremor?  All  was  simple  now, 
and  highly  adventurous  besides.  And  then  there  was  Jack  Dal- 
housie  to  whom  even  a  day  or  two,  now  that  she  stopped  to  think 
of  it,  would  probably  make  a  good  deal  of  difference.  .  .  . 

Turning  again  with  bright  cheeks,  Cally  encountered  strange 
faces;  and  then,  in  a  second  or  two,  the  familiar  ones  of  her 
mother  and  Canning,  both  looking  back  for  her.  .  .  . 

" There  you  are!"  she  laughed,  coming  up  with  them  again. 
"What  an  exciting  jam!" 

They  proceeded  into  the  dining-place  and  to  their  table,  a 
somewhat  ceremonial  progress  headed  by  three  spiketails.  Even 
in  that  display  of  beauty,  wealth,  consequence,  and  their  lifelike 
imitations,  these  three,  or  perhaps  we  should  say  these  two,  drew 
much  attention.  Carlisle  was  conscious  of  lorgnettes;  once  she 
caught  the  whisper  of  the  name  so  soon  to  be  her  own.  Late  as 
they  were,  the  room  was  still  crowded:  the  well-bred  but  wander 
ing  eye  saw  no  vacant  seat  anywhere.  There  was  music  in  the 
air,  and  the  clash  of  cutlery,  the  vocal  hum,  and  the  faint  tinkle 
of  glasses.  There  were  flushing  faces  and  eyes  that  sparkled  like 
the  wine,  and  of  it,  many  fragrances  commingled,  of  flowers,  chefs' 
chefs-d'oeuvre,  of  Pinaud  and  Roget.  Through  all,  too,  was  to  be 
felt  the  hard  inquisitive  stare  of  New  York,  each  man  wondering 
who  and  whence  his  neighbor  was,  speculating  under  his  smile  as 
to  which  man  of  them  made,  on  the  whole,  the  best  appearance, 
seemed  most  plentiful  of  his  money.  .  .  . 

Pink-shaded  candles  stood  on  the  little  table;  also  La  France 
roses  of  Canning's  purchasing;  also  glasses,  three  more  of  them 
brought  as  they  took  their  seats. 

"Do  you  spurn  your  cocktail,  Carlisle?"  asked  Canning,  and 
when  she  convivially  indicated  that  she  did  n't,  he  added,  man 
toman:  "How!" 

"How,"  said  Cally. 

She  touched  it  to  her  lips,  giving  back  his  smile  over  the  rim  of 
her  glass,  and  feeling  gay,  indeed.  Two  cocktails  before  one  din 
ner  —  well ! 

257 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"What  kind  of  one  is  this,  Hugo?"  she  demanded,  quite 
knowingly. 

Canning  named  it. 

"Well,  then,"  said  she,  "it  was  a  Bronx  I  had  before." 

She  did  not  say  before  what,  and  nobody  asked.  About  them, 
as  they  sat  in  the  lively  hum,  circled  servitors  without  end.  One 
fellow  had  brought  their  bit  of  caviare;  another  bore  away  the 
traces  of  it;  another  had  no  share  of  them  but  to  fetch  crisp  rolls. 
Little  omnibuses  in  white  suits  moved  about,  gathering  up 
papers  or  napkins  dropped  by  careless  diners;  bigger  omnibuses 
in  dinner  jackets  exported  trays  of  dishes  which  the  lordly 
artists  of  the  serving  force  were  above  touching.  Other  varlets 
merely  stood  about  and  cooed.  .  .  . 

Dinner,  having  begun  with  the  cocktails,  swept  on  with  a  rattle 
of  talk.  There  was  debate  about  the  theatre  afterwards.  The 
girl's  eyes  turned  often  toward  the  door. 

"What  do  you  think  of  it  all,  Carlisle?" 

"Sweet,  Hugo!  ...  So  simple  and  artless  and  homey!" 

"Exactly,"  said  Canning;  and  obtained  permission  for  a  cigar 
ette.  "But  yet  interesting  as  a  vaudeville  show,  don't  you  think? 
What  so  amusing  as  to  see  human  vanity  displaying  itself  not 
merely  without  reserve  but  with  a  terrific  blowing  of  horns?" 

"Well  put,  Hugo!"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  who  held  that  any  kind  of 
generalization  constituted  good  talk.  She  added:  "Who  are  all 
these  people?  How  would  one  place  them?" 

Canning  could  indicate  a  celebrity  or  two.  He  had  bowed 
several  times,  finding  acquaintances,  it  seemed,  even  in  this  glit 
tering  farrago.  But  his  eyes  returned  to1  his  bride-to-be,  from 
whom  he  removed  his  gaze  with  reluctance  to-night.  She  wore  a 
dress  of  yellow  crepe-de-chine,  with  a  draped  arrangement  of  blue 
chiffon,  which  followed  faithfully  the  long  lines  of  her  figure; 
and  a  hat  of  blue  straw  with  an  uncurled  yellow  plume.  It  was 
a  beautiful  dress,  though  mamma  considered  it  just  a  thought 
too  low,  even  with  a  handkerchief  put  in. 

And  Cally  looked  back  at  her  lover  and  thought :  Who  so  hon 
ored  and  honorable  as  he?  He  '11  only  be  sorry  that  I  've  waited  so 
long.  .  .  . 

258 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Only,"  she  said,  aloud,  "they  do  keep  the  room  rather  hot  for 
the  provinces,  where  some  air  is  preferred.  More  good  things  to 
eat,  Hugo?  It's  a  collation.  .  .  ." 

"A  poor  one,  I'm  afraid.  You've  touched  nothing." 

He  dispatched  an  army  of  men  to  adjust  electric  fans,  turn 
patent  ventilators,  and  even  to  do  so  crude  a  thing  as  open  a 
window. 

"It  is  all  most  delicious,  Hugo,"  reassured  Mrs.  Heth.  "I 
had  n't  noticed  that  the  room  was  warm,  either." 

"  My  cheeks  are  burning.  Touch  my  hand,  Hugo.  You  see  it 's 
on  fire." 

All  three  looked  up  as  a  boy  in  buttons  stood  at  Carlisle's 
elbow,  and  said: 

"  Got  your  party  on  the  wire,  mum." 

"Party  on  the  wire?  What's  this?"  said  mamma. 

Carlisle  laid  her  napkin  on  the  table.  Surprise  confronted  her, 
written  large  on  the  faces  of  her  mother  and  her  lover;  but  it  did 
not  arrest  her. 

"  I 'm  wanted  at  the  telephone.  Do  you  mind,  Hugo?  I  won't 
be  gone  a  minute." 

" But  —  you  mustn't  go  now,  my  dear!"  said  Mrs.  Heth, 
astonished.  "Let  the  boy  take  the  number.  Why  —  who  on 
earth  could  it  be,  calling  you  here?  — " 

"I'd  rather  go  now,  mamma,  if  Hugo '11  forgive  me  — " 

"It's  from  Flora!"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  positively.  "No  one  else 
knew.  A  telegram's  come,  saying  your  father  is  sick  — " 

Carlisle  laughed  and  rose  dazzingly,  burning  without  but 
colder  than  Alpine  snow  within. 

"Not  in  the  least,  mamma  dear!  You  see  I  put  in  this  call 
myself.  I'll  explain  all  about  it  in  a  minute.  ..." 

Explain!  Why  she  would  walk  back  to  this  table  from  the 
telephone,  laughing,  and  saying:  "Now,  praise  me,  Hugo  and 
mamma,  for  I've  just  been  doing  a  deed  of  mercy!  Do  you  re 
member  that  day  at  the  Beach?  ..."  Was  it  the  fear  of  this  that 
she  had  let  plague  her  all  these  days?  .  .  . 

"To  be  answered  here  —  at  dinner  —  in  this  public  place? 
Why,  my  dear  Cally,  I  really  ..." 

259 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

But  Hugo,  the  understanding,  though  personally  opposed  to 
interruptions  during  dinner,  knew  the  folly  of  arguing  with  the 
whims  of  the  unreasoners.  He  had  risen  with  Carlisle,  and  now 
said:  "I'll  show  you  the  way." 

Cally  gave  him  a  look  of  exquisite  gratitude,  but  answered: 
"Please  don't  trouble,  Hugo!  The  boy  will  — " 

"No  trouble.  Let's  be  off  before  the  tolls  eat  you  out  of  house 
and  home." 

"  Oh,  no !  Please  don't !  Could  n't  I  have  my  way  about  such  a 
little  matter,  Hugo  dear?" 

In  this  glaring  publicity,  the  dialogue  began  to  take  on  some 
thing  of  the  nature  of  a  "scene."  Canning  yielded  with  perfect 
grace. 

"Of  course  you  can,  if  you  really  prefer  it.  Well,  then!  .  .  . 
Hurry  back." 

"In  two  minutes,"  said  she,  with  certainty;  and  smiled 
brightly  into  mamma's  censorious  concern. 

On  the  heels  of  the  proud  page,  Cally  threaded  her  way 
among  the  glittering  tables  for  the  telephone  and  Jefferson  4127, 
unaware  for  once  that  she  was  the  cynosure  of  many  eyes.  She 
was  buoyed  within,  thrilled  with  a  sense  of  strange  adventure, 
baffling  to  analysis,  but  somehow  comparable  to  that  soaring 
moment  last  week.  She  was  captain  of  her  soul.  That  she  was 
now  standing  by  her  flare-up,  deliberately  reattaching  herself 
to  a  past  which  she  had  moved  heaven  and  earth  to  cut  away 
from  her,  did  not  occur  to  her,  in  just  that  way.  But  she  was 
conscious  of  a  curious  inner  sense  of  freedom,  and  somehow  of 
fulfilment.  And  now  she  saw  that  she  must  have  been  secretly 
thinking  of  doing  this  for  some  tune,  nibbling  fearfully  at  the 
idea.  .  .  . 

She  was  alone  in  a  glass  booth,  with  a  telephone  before  her, 
receiver  off  its  hook.  She  sat  down,  put  the  receiver  to  her  ear, 
and  said: 

"Hello?" 

There  reached  her  only  a  faint  great  buzzing,  the  humming  of 
distant  wires,  fleeting  snatches  of  talk  a  long  way  off,  striking  out 
of  nowhere  back  into  nothing.  .  .  .  And  now  she  was  the  Lady 

260 


PLEASE  DON'T  TROUBLE,  HUGO 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


Bountiful,  stepping  aside  a  moment  from  her  brilliant  entourage 
to  scatter  boons  to  the  poor  and  needy.  Jack  Dalhousie  would 
know  to-morrow  morning,  at  the  latest,  by  the  telegram  from  his 
friend  Mr.  V.  V.,  —  as  that  little  creature  called  him,  —  and 
whatever  vexation  he  might  be  inclined  to  feel  towards  her  at 
first,  his  joy  and  his  father's  would  soon  dispose  of  that.  And  of 
course  he  would  hurry  straight  off  with  his  news  to  that  girl  from 
the  East  he  had  fallen  in  love  with  —  what  a  hand  he  was  for 
affairs,  poor  old  Jack !  —  and  .  .  . 

Out  of  the  confused  murmuring,  a  soft  voice  spoke  clearly: 

"Hello,  New  York.  I  got  your  party.  What's  the  matter?" 

A  nasal  voice  gave  answer,  apparently  at  Carlisle's  elbow: 

"Well,  be  ca'm,  little  one.     You  people  got  the  rush-bug 
worsen  some  full-size  cities  aintyer?   Butt  out  and  gimme  a 
chanst.  Hello!  Were  arey'r,  Bassadoors!" 
*   "Here  I  am,"  said  Bassadoors. 

"MissHeth?" 

"I  am  Miss  Heth." 

"Minute  'm  .  .  ." 

In  the  glass  beside  her  Cally  caught  a  reflection  of  her  head  and 
bare  shoulders,  and  her  eyes  were  shining,  the  long  and  slightly 
tri-corner  eyes  so  piquantly  fringed.  A  minute  —  that  was  all  it 
would  take.  A  minute  more  and  she  would  thread  her  way  back 
through  the  glitter  to  Hugo  and  mamma,  and  Hugo  at  least 
would  say  well-done.  .  .  . 

"Well,  whatsermatter?  There  y'  are!" 

The  soft  voice  said:  "All  right,  Dr.  Vivian.  Ready  now!  .  .  . 
Hello  !  All  right " 

"Hello,"  said  Cally. 

Then  all  sounds  faded  away,  and  out  of  a  sudden  great  desert 
of  silence,  she  heard  a  man's  voice,  clear  though  it  came  all  the 
way  from  Meeghan's  Grocery,  across  the  street  from  the  old 
Dabney  House,  back  home. 

"Hello?" 

Mr.  V.  V.! 

And  the  moment  she  heard  that  voice,  Carlisle  was  aware  that 
her  feeling  toward  the  owner  of  it  had  mysteriously  changed 

261 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


somewhere  in  the  last  week,  that  he  stood  in  her  mind  now  almost 
as  a  friend.  Had  he  not  been,  by  the  strangeness  of  fate,  her  one 
confidant  in  the  world,  who  now  could  never  think  of  her 
again  as  a  poor  little  thing?  .  .  . 

"Dr.  Vivian?  .  .  .  Can  you  guess  who  it  is?  Or  did  the 
operator  give  me  away?" 

"Yes  ...  I  don't  hear  you  very  well  .  .  .  Where  are  you?" 

"I'm  in  New  York,  if  you  please,  to  sail  for  Europe  next  week! 
We  left  home  last  night Is  that  better?" 

"Yes  .  .  .  That's  much  better." 

Mr.  V.  V.'s  voice,  over  the  long  miles  of  wire,  sounded  strained 
and  hard;  but  the  girl  noticed  nothing,  being  full  of  novel 
thrills. 

"Perhaps  you  can  guess  why  I've  called  you  up.  ...  Though, 
you  know,  it  was  to  be  a  secret  unless  you  saw  me  again,  and  I 
really  don't  count  a  letter  as  seeing!  .  .  ." 

"I  did  n't  see  you,"  came  back  the  unfamiliar  voice.  "I  am  to 
blame." 

"Ah,  but  the  letter  was  just  as  good,"  said  Carlisle,  and 
laughed  excitedly  into  the  transmitter.  And  then,  having  never 
admitted  any  particular  sense  of  guilt,  having  felt  almost  no 
"conviction  of  sin"  as  religious  fellows  would  term  it,  she  went 
on  without  the  smallest  embarrassment:  "You  see,  I  flew  into  a 
panic  for  some  reason,  and  did  n't  mean  for  you  ever  to  see  me 
again.  I  ran  away!  And  then  I  couldn't  get  his  letter  out  of 
mind  —  I 'd  never  taken  it  in  that  he  was  so  miserable,  really!  — 
and  I  was  quite  ashamed  of  being  such  a  coward.  And  so,"  she 
said,  the  upward-lifting  lip  pressing  the  instrument  in  her  eager 
ness,  "I've  called  up  now  to  say  I  want  — " 

His  voice  broke  in,  not  with  the  burst  of  praise  and  thanks 
giving  she  had  looked  for,  but  only  to  say  abruptly  and  anti- 
climacterically : 

"I  can't  hear  you.  Will  you  say  that  again?" 

However,  but  few  words  were  needed,  after  all,  to  ring  this 
climax.  Carlisle  said,  slowly  and  distinctly: 

"  I  say  I  want  you  to  tell  Mr.  Dalhousie  now  —  and  his  father, 
too.  To-night,  if  you  wish." 

262 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Then  there  was  a  desolating  silence,  out  of  which  she  heard 
something  far  off  like  a  man  groaning. 

"Hello!"  she  called  sharply.  "Are  you  there?" 

"Where  are  you,  Miss  Heth?"  was  Dr.  Vivian's  reply;  and 
his  voice  was  like  the  voice  of  the  man  who  had  groaned.  .  .  . 
"Are  you  in  your  room  at  the  hotel?  Is  your  mother  with  you 
there?" 

Singular  words  these,  from  the  receiver  of  confidences  and  high 
favors.  There  fell  upon  Cally  a  nameless  fear. 

"N-no  — I'm  alone Why,  what—" 

"  Could  I  speak  to  your  mother  a  moment  —  first?  I  have  some 
bad  news.  It  would  be  better  — " 

"No  —  tell  me!  My  mother's  at  dinner.  I  —  what  are  you 
talking  about?  ..." 

Had  he  betrayed  her  already,  then?  Was  the  town  now  ringing 
with  her  name?  Had  Colonel  Dalhousie  .  .  . 

Quite  distinctly,  though  he  evidently  was  not  addressing  her, 
she  heard  the  man's  hard  voice  say:  "This  cannot  be  borne." 
,  And  then  in  a  different  voice,  there  came  these  words  over  the 
miles  from  Meeghan's  Grocery: 

"Miss  Heth  —  I  did  n't  see  you  when  I  should  have  —  and 
now  we  are  just  too  late.  I  can't  reach  Dal  now." 

"You  — don't  mean?..." 

"He  is  dead." 

"Dead/" 

And  it  was  this  girl's  shame,  the  fruit  of  her  long  fear,  that  her 
first  feeling  was  one  of  base  relief.  So  works  Nature's  first  law. 
Dal  was  dead;  all  was  settled;  there  was  nothing  to  tell  now.  And 
then,  as  by  the  turning  of  a  corner,  she  came  front  to  front  with  a 
sudden  horror,  and  there  unrolled  before  her  a  moment  of  black 
ness.  .  .  . 

"You  must  not  blame  yourself  too  hard,"  came  the  distant 
voice,  dropping  out  of  space  like  the  sentences  of  destiny.  "  It 's . . . 
cruel,  the  way  it's  happened.  But  you'll  always  know  you  had 
the  courage  and  the  will  to  set  him  free,  when  you  might  — " 

Carlisle's  hand  clenched  the  edge  of  the  little  table  where  she 
sat. 

263 


V.    V.  fs     Eyes 


"Tell  me,"  said  her  voice,  pitifully  faint.  "Did  he  ...  I  — 
must  know  —  Did  he  .  .  .  ?" 

There  was  a  roaring  in  her  ears,  but  through  it  the  words  came 
clear  as  flame: 

"He  went  out  of  his  mind.  I  know  that.  That  could  not  be 
foreseen.  Not  waiting  ...  he  took  his  own  life.  It  was  this  after 
noon.  A  telegram  came  —  from  some  friend  of  his  .  .  ." 

All  further  words,  if  more  there  were,  bounded  off  from  the 
sudden  iron  stillness  within  her.  Mechanically  she  raised  the 
receiver  to  the  hook,  for  was  not  her  talk  with  Meeghan's  quite 
finished?  Jack  Dalhousie  had  killed  himself.  Sackcloth  and 
ashes  would  not  get  a  telegram  to  him  now.  . . .  And  then,  some 
flying  remembrance  of  the  bearer  of  the  tidings  struck  through 
her  numbness,  and  she  caught  down  the  receiver  again  and  said 
indistinctly: 

"I  can't  talk  any  more  now I'll  be  all  right  .  .  ." 

Then  all  thought  stopped,  and  her  head  went  forward  upon 
her  hands.  The  yellow  plume  nodded  bravely.  .  .  . 

Outside  the  door  of  the  booth  was  the  brilliant  corridor,  and 
beyond  a  glimpse  of  the  dining-room,  pretty  with  shaded  lights, 
gay  with  music  and  talk,  and  eyes  that  stared  unabashed.  Some 
where  in  there  were  Mrs.  Heth  and  Canning,  dining  well. 

The  page  stood  near,  the  call-slip  offered  upon  his  tray.  He, 
who  admired  her,  was  aware  of  a  subtle  distortion  in  this  lady's 
winning  loveliness. 

"Take  it,  please,"  said  she,  "to  the  lady  at  the  table  where  you 
found  me.  And  say  I  shall  not  come  back  to  dinner." 

Then  Carlisle  found  herself  in  the  cloak-room,  which  happened 
to  be  empty  except  for  the  smiling  maid.  She  had  hardly  entered 
and  repelled  the  woman's  overtures,  when  she  heard  the  hurried 
step  of  her  mother,  brought  quickly  by  the  buttons'  strange 
words. 

"Cally!  Are  you  ill?  What  on  earth 's  happened?  " 

Cally  sat  stiffly  in  a  chair  against  the  wall,  her  face  colorless. 
Different,  this,  from  the  telling  she  had  contemplated,  not  five 
minutes  ago.  What  had  happened,  indeed? 

She  said  in  a  small  flat  voice:  "I  heard  some  bad  news  —  over 

264 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


the  telephone.  A  man  —  has  died.  He  killed  himself,  this  after 
noon  — " 

Commanding  even  in  that  moment,  Mrs.  Heth  turned  upon 
the  hovering  maid  and  said:  "A  glass  of  water." 

When  the  woman  had  passed  out  of  earshot,  she  turned  again, 
and  put  her  two  strong  hands  on  Cally's  shoulders. 

"What  man?  Who  was  this  you  called  up  long-distance?" 

"Mr.  Dalhousie,"  said  Cally's  small  voice.  "I  called  up  a 
friend  of  his.  .  .  ."  She  looked  up  fixedly  at  her  mother  and  said: 
"Mamma,  he  did  it  because  of  me." 

The  name  of  ill  omen  staggered  the  mother  a  little.  Her  voice 
was  half  harsh,  half  frightened: 

"Because  of  you!  You  are  ill,  my  poor  child.  The  shock  has 
upset  you.  You  are  out  of  your  head.  The  boy's  mind  was  un 
hinged  by  drink.  Every  one  said  so.  He  had  broken  his  father's 
heart  with— " 

"But  he  did  this  because  of  me.  Because  of  what  I  let  every 
body  think  of  him.  .  .  .  Mamma,  I  —  I  must  go  back  home. 
I'm  sorry  to  upset  everything  so  .  .  ." 

The  maid  stood  by  with  her  tray  and  glass,  but  no  hand  reached 
for  the  offering. 

"Back  to  the  hotel?  Of  course!  —  you  are  ill,  my  poor  dear! 
You  need  rest.  .  .  ." 

"I  mean  back  home.  You  see  I  can't  be  here  now  .  .  .  when 
this  has  happened.  I  must  go  now,  to-night.  I  remember  the 
train  goes  at  nine-fifty-five." 

Mrs.  Heth,  wheeling  upon  the  maid  with  livid  perturbation, 
cried: 

"Get  my  wraps." 


XX 


In  which  Jack  Dalhousie  wears  a  New  Dignity,  and  the  Lame 
Stranger  comes  to  the  House  of  Heth. 

DALHOUSIE  had  been  worthless  while  he  lived.  Now  he 
had  achieved  the  last  supreme  importance.  The  inconsid 
erable  of  yesterday  wore  a  mute  and  mighty  power.  So  he 
reached  over  the  spaces,  and  broke  the  brilliant  dinner-party  at 
the  Cafe  des  Ambassadeurs.  So  Mrs.  Heth  and  Carlisle  Heth 
disputed,  by  this  new  great  dignity  that  was  his,  and  talked  in  the 
hotel  bedroom,  and  hurriedly  changed  evening  attire  for  travel 
ling  suits.  And  so  Hugo  Canning,  abruptly  widowed  at  a  railway 
station,  was  left  to  toss  wakefully  that  night,  ridden  by  deepen 
ing  anxieties.  .  .  . 

For  Cally  had  carried  her  extraordinary  point;  now  that  Jack 
Dalhousie  was  henceforward  indifferent  to  all  these  matters. 

She  had  said,  with  the  deadly  flatness  of  the  mood  which  her 
mother  so  dreaded,  that  she  wanted  to  go  home  to-night,  and  there 
had  been  no  reasoning  with  her.  Go  home  for  what?  Mrs.  Heth 
had  asked  it  twenty  times,  battling  desperately  against  the 
menacing  madness,  now  with  argument  and  threat,  now  with 
tears  and  wheedlings.  And  Cally,  proceeding  dry-eyed  with  her 
dressing  and  bag-packing,  had  proved  unable  to  produce  a  single 
solid  reason. 

Still,  it  became  clear  that  lock  and  key  would  not  keep  her.  The 
options  ensuing  were  whether  her  mother  should  go  with  her,  or 
Hugo  should  go,  or  Cally  be  allowed  to  go  alone.  Small  choice 
here,  indeed. 

Of  that  evening  the  events  following  the  hurried  departure  from 
the  Ambassadeurs  were  always  blurred  in  Carlisle's  memory.  To 
Mrs.  Heth  each  detail  remained  crystal-clear  as  long  as  she  lived. 
Upon  her  shoulders,  as  usual,  fell  the  burden  of  managing  every 
thing  so  that  the  least  harm  should  befall.  Defeated,  and  conse- 

266 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


quently  hatted  and  cloaked,  she  emerged  from  the  bedroom  at 
quarter-past  nine  o'clock,  commissioned  by  her  daughter  to  tell 
Canning  everything.  But  what  was  everything,  and  what  the 
mere  gibberish  of  nervous  insanity,  to  pass  forever  from  the  hori 
zon  with  a  good  night's  sleep?  Mrs.  Heth,  seated  before  her  living 
Order  of  Merit  in  the  sitting-room,  interpreted  her  commission 
with  a  mother's  wise  discretion. 

Canning,  at  this  point,  knew  only  that  Carlisle  was  unnerved 
by  news  of  the  death  of  a  friend.  In  the  drive  from  the  restaurant 
he  had  been  cautioned  to  ask  no  questions,  hysterics  being  inti 
mated  otherwise.  Now  Mrs.  Heth  gave  him  certain  selected  par 
ticulars:  of  a  man  who  had  been  in  love  with  Carlisle  some  years 
ago,  though  she  had  always  discouraged  him;  of  a  misunder 
standing  that  had  arisen  between  them,  which  he,  the  man,  had 
never  got  over;  and  now  of  his  sudden  decease,  which  came  as  a 
shock  to  the  poor  girl,  awakening  painful  memories,  and  giving 
rise  to  a  purely  momentary  sense  of  morbid  responsibility. 

"But  why,"  said  Canning,  more  and  more  mystified  as  he  lis 
tened,  " should  she  want  to  go  back  home?" 

"I  regard  it,"  answered  Mrs.  Heth,  "as  a  tribute  to  the 
dead." 

"Why,  she  doesn't  know  what  she's  doing!  .  .  .  You  must 
simply  forbid  her  going." 

"Forbid  her!"  groaned  the  little  general,  like  one  flicked  upon 
a  new  wound. 

And,  before  proceeding  further,  she  was  actually  artful  and 
strong  enough  to  make  the  young  man  arrange — provisionally, 
she  said,  —  about  reservations,  a  matter  which  valuably  con 
sumed  time. 

If  the  good  lady  had  now  believed  that  all  was  lost,  she  would 
have  instantly  invoked  Canning's  authority,  telling  him  every 
thing.  But  as  yet  she  would  not  risk  that,  clinging  hard  to  the 
hope  that  Cally's  sanity  might  come  again  with  the  sun  of  a 
new  day.  To-night  she  was  for  the  greatest  suppression  possible, 
one  eye  perpetually  on  the  little  travelling-clock.  However,  the 
telephoning  at  last  over,  more  details  could  not  be  avoided.  It 
perforce  transpired  that  the  dead  man  was  the  villain  of  that 

267 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

unfortunate  episode  at  the  Beach,  which  Hugo  possibly  recalled, 
—  he  did,  —  and  finally  that  it  was  worry  over  his  disgrace,  aided 
by  unremitting  potations,  that  had  brought  him  to  his  death 

The  faint  frown  on  Hugo's  brow  deepened,  became  more 
troubled.  He  paced  the  floor. 

"And  still,"  said  he,  "I  fail  to  see  why  Carlisle  must  go  home 
to-night.  What  does  she  expect  to  do  when  she  gets  there?  " 

What,  indeed?  Mrs.  Heth  mentioned  again  the  tribute  to  the 
dead.  The  girl,  in  her  shocked  state,  considered  it  unfeeling  for 
her  to  remain  here  enjoying  herself  with  Hugo,  as  if  nothing  had 
happened.  Foolish?  —  who  saw  it  better  than  she,  Mrs.  Heth? 
But  that  was  Cally,  sweet  and  good  at  heart  always,  yet  liable 
to  emotional  fits  in  upset  moments  when  opposition  only  made 
her  ill.  Let  her  have  her  morbid  way  to-night,  and  she  would 
return  in  twenty-four  hours,  her  own  sweet  natural  self.  .  .  . 

Canning  liked  it  less  and  less.  Was  not  this  clearly  a  moment 
when  the  strong  mind  of  a  man  should  assert  itself  over  foolish 
feminine  hysteria? 

"How  did  she  happen  to  get  this  news  just  now?"  he  asked, 
abruptly.  "Who  was  it  she  called  up,  about  what?" 

He  had  lost  sight  of  this  point  in  the  general  flurry  of  sensation. 
It  struck  him  now  just  too  late  to  bring  results.  At  the  moment, 
the  door  from  the  bedrooms  opened  —  exactly  as  it  had  two  hours 
earlier,  only  with  what  a  difference !  —  and  Carlisle  appeared  on 
the  threshold,  very  pale  and  subdued,  but  to  her  lover's  eye  never 
more  moving. 

"I'm  so  sorry  to  bring  you  into  all  this  trouble,  Hugo,"  she 
said,  in  a  strained  little  voice.  ..."  And  when  we  were  having 
such  a  happy  time.  ..." 

All  thought  of  putting  down  his  foot  faded  at  once  from  Can 
ning's  mind,  obliterated  in  a  wave  that  went  through  him,  half 
passion,  half  pure  tenderness.  Indifferent  to  Mrs.  Heth,  he  ad 
vanced  and  took  the  girl  in  his  arms,  speaking  in  a  manly  way  the 
sympathy  with  her  distress  which  rushed  up  in  him  at  that  mo 
ment.  And  then  he  said  words  that  went  with  Carlisle  as  a  com 
fort  all  through  the  night. 

"  Your  trouble  is  my  own,  Carlisle.  I  'm  with  you  in  everything 

268 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

now,  happiness  or  unhappiness.  Whatever  happens,  you  know  my 
heart  and  strength  are  yours  through  all  time." 

Carlisle,  too  deeply  moved  to  speak,  thanked  her  lover  with 
a  look.  The  moment's  silence  was  broken  by  Mrs.  Heth,  reso 
lutely  blowing  her  nose.  And  then  all  opportunity  for  talk  was 
lost  in  the  rush  for  the  train. 

To  herself  she  seemed  to  lie  endlessly  between  sleeping  and 
waking:  and  the  rhythmic  noises  of  the  train  sounded  a  continual 
cadence,  Dalhousie's  unquiet  requiem.  But  she  must  have  fallen 
sound  asleep  without  knowing  it;  for  her  eyes  opened  suddenly 
with  a  start,  and  she  was  aware  of  the  clanging  of  bells,  the  wax 
ing  and  waning  of  men's  voices,  the  hiss  of  steam  and  the  flaring 
of  yellow  lights.  Looking  out  under  the  blind,  she  saw  that  they 
had  come  to  a  city,  which  must  be  Philadelphia.  Two  hours 
nearer  home.  .  .  . 

Now  her  wakefulness  had  a  sharper  quality;  Cally  lay  wide- 
eyed,  in  a  dazed  chill  wonder.  Once  in  the  night  she  pushed  up 
the  curtain,  raised  herself  on  an  elbow  in  the  stateroom  berth; 
and  her  splendid  gay  hair,  loosened  with  much  tossing,  streamed 
downward  over  her  shoulders.  Outside  was  a  world  of  moon- 
Jit  peace.  The  flying  trees  had  tops  of  silver;  meadows  danced 
by  in  splotches  of  light  and  shade;  once  they  sped  over  a  lovely 
river.  Strange  to  think,  that  if  she  had  but  said  on  that  far 
away  day,  "He  frightened  me  so,  I  didn't  want  to  call  him 
back,"  —  just  those  words,  how  few  and  simple,  —  she  would 
not  be  hurrying  home  now,  with  everything  ahead  so  dark,  so 
terrifying.  And,  though  she  seemed  to  try  a  long  time,  she 
could  not  think  now  why  she  had  not  said  these  words,  could  not 
weigh  those  slight  fanciful  tremors  against  this  vast  icy  void.  .  . . 

She  fell  asleep;  woke  again  to  more  clanging  and  hissing;  slept 
and  dreamed  badly;  and  suddenly  sat  up  in  the  berth,  confusedly, 
to  find  it  broad  day,  and  the  sun  streaming  through  the  little 
crevice  beneath  the  curtain.  Her  mother  was  standing  braced  in 
the  aisle  of  the  little  room,  dressing  systematically. 

"We've  passed  Penton.  You'd  better  get  up,"  said  the  brisk 
familiar  tones. 

269 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

And  she  eyed  her  daughter  narrowly  as  she  asked  if  she  had 
slept. 

Home  again.  This  time  yesterday,  who  would  have  dreamed 
this  possible?  .  .  . 

And  then,  after  just  enough  time  to  dress,  they  began  to  pass 
landmarks,  and  presently  to  slacken  speed;  and  then  they  were 
stepping  down  from  the  train,  out  into  the  hotch-potch  gathering 
on  the  sunny  station  platform. 

Both  women  were  heavily  veiled.  Mrs.  Heth's  furtive  glances 
discovered  no  one  who  was  likely  to  hail  them,  demanding  what 
in  the  world  these  things  meant.  A  ramshackle  hack  invited  and 
received  them.  And,  jogging  over  streets  crowded  with  a  life 
time's  associations,  the  Heths  presently  came  to  their  own  house, 
whose  face  they  had  not  thought  to  see  again  these  four 
months.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Heth  was  away,  fishing,  in  a  spot  dear  to  his  heart,  but  re 
mote  from  railroad  or  telegraph.  The  House  of  Heth  looked  like  a 
deserted  house ;  its  blinds  were  drawn  from  fourth  story  to  base 
ment.  However,  there  was  old  Moses,  bowing  and  running  down 
the  steps  to  open  the  carriage  door  and  assist  with  the  hand- 
luggage.  He  greeted  the  ladies  with  courtliness,  and  inquired 
mout  anybody  be  sick.  Answered  vaguely  on  this  point,  he  an-, 
nounced  that  he  had  breakfast  ready- waiting  on  the  table ;  this, 
though  Mr.  Canning's  telegraph  never  retched  him  till  nea'bout 
eight  o'clock.  His  tone  indicated  a  pride  of  accomplishment  not, 
he  hoped,  unjustified. 

Having  removed  the  more  superficial  stains  of  travel,  the 
two  women  sat  at  table  in  the  half-dismantled  dining-room. 
It  was  a  meal  not  easily  to  be  forgotten,  made  the  more  fan 
tastic  by  Mrs.  Heth's  determined  attempts  to  act  as  if  nothing 
in  particular  had  happened.  From  her  remarks  to  the  ancient 
family  retainer  it  appeared  that  she  and  Miss  Carlisle  had  re 
turned  home  to  attend  to  a  business  matter  of  no  great  conse 
quence,  overlooked  in  the  rush  of  departure.  And  she  demanded, 
quite  as  if  that  were  the  very  business  referred  to,  whether  the 
plumber  had  come  to  stop  the  drip  in  the  white-room  bath 
room. 

270 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

The  butler's  reply  took  a  not  unfamiliar  direction.  The 
plumber,  and  his  helper,  had  come  and  'xperimented  round:  but 
they  had  not  yet  stopped  the  drip.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth  ate  heartily,  with  a  desperate  matter-of-factness. 
It  was  half-past  nine  o'clock.  Nothing  had  happened  yet,  at  any 
rate.  Beside  her,  Carlisle  had  more  difficulty  with  her  breakfast, 
hampered  by  her  continuing  mind's-eye  picture  of  Jack  Dal- 
housie,  lying  on  his  back  on  a  floor  somewhere.  Might  it  be  that, 
as  this  horror  made  telling  so  much  harder,  it  also  altered  the 
whole  necessity?  There  were  plenty  of  arguments  of  mamma's 
to  that  effect 

"Mr.  Heth  got  off  all  right,  Moses?"  demanded  that  resolute 
lady.  "Take  some  more  tea,  Cally.  You  must  really  try  to  eat 
something,  my  child  — " 

"I  have  eaten  —  a  great  deal,"  said  Cally.  And  pushing  back 
her  chair  then,  she  added:  "I  think  I  —  I'll  try  to  rest  a  little 
while,  mamma.  I  feel  —  tired  after  the  trip." 

"  Do ! "  said  mamma,  further  encouraged.  "  Sleep  a  little  if  you 
can,  my  dear.  It's  just  what  you  need.  .  .  ." 

But  Cally  did  not  sleep.  It  had  seemed  to  her  that  she  must 
be  alone  for  a  time,  to  try  to  think  out  what  was  to  happen;  but 
now  she  saw  that  she  had  no  need  to  think.  Of  the  complex 
nervous  and  emotional  reaction  which  had  brought  her  flying 
home,  she  had,  indeed,  seemed  to  understand  nothing  except  that 
it  was  irresistible;  her  mind  was  like  a  dark  cloud,  refusing  to 
yield  up  its  meanings.  Nevertheless,  there  seemed  to  be  no  doubt 
as  to  what  she  must  do  now.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth,  having  remained  downstairs  half  an  hour  longer, 
ascended  quietly,  the  beginnings  of  great  gratitude  in  her  heart. 
They  were  feelings  born  but  to  die.  Just  at  the  head  of  the  stairs 
she  encountered  Cally,  emerging  like  an  apparition  from  the  door 
of  the  family  sitting-room.  The  girl  spoke  in  a  small  voice: 

"  Mamma,  I  want  to  send  for  Dr.  Vivian  —  to  come  and  see 
me." 

Mamma,  just  thinking  that  this  madness  was  finally  dis 
posed  of,  was  taken  suddenly.  Even  the  birthmark  on  her 
temple,  which  was  partially  exposed,  seemed  to  turn  pale.  .  .  . 

271 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

But  once  more  Carlisle  carried  her  extraordinary  point.  Ever 
since  she  was  a  little  girl  she  had  been  subject  to  these  incalcula 
ble  fits,  when  punishment  made  her  ill,  but  did  not  conquer  the 
seven  devils  that  possessed  her.  Mrs.  Heth,  frantic  after  nearly 
an  hour's  thundering,  vanished  into  the  telephone-booth,  bent 
upon  reaching  Mr.  Heth  while  there  was  yet  time.  But  even  now 
her  strongest  thought  was  that  Cally  was  a  sensible  girl  at  heart, 
in  the  last  pinch  simply  incapable  of  self-destructive  folly. 

Cally,  also,  had  thought  of  the  telephone.  But  the  sight  of  it, 
after  last  night,  unnerved  her.  She  withdrew  to  the  little  desk  in 
her  bedroom. 

So  the  word  of  the  Lord  came  to  the  Dabney  House,  by  the 
hand  of  an  old  negro  gentleman. 

He  was  standing  in  the  middle  of  the  floor,  when  Carlisle  went 
down,  an  inconsonant  figure  amid  the  showy  splendors  of  the 
Heth  drawing-room.  So  much  appeared  to  the  most  casual  obser 
vation.  Far  deeper  to  the  understanding  eye  went  the  incon 
sistency  of  this  man's  presence  here,  in  an  hour  of  appalling 
intimacy. 

Carlisle,  entering  through  the  uncurtained  doorway,  halted 
involuntarily  just  over  the  threshold.  Her  eye,  at  least,  saw  all. 
And  she  was  abruptly  and  profoundly  affected  by  the  sight  of 
him  in  her  familiar  background,  the  author  of  the  Beach  opinion 
of  her,  who  truly  had  never  meant  anything  but  trouble  for  her 
since  the  first  moment  she  saw  him.  Time,  indeed,  had  given  the 
religious  fellow  his  last  full  measure  of  revenge.  .  .  . 

Prepared  speeches  of  some  dignity  and  length  slipped  from  her. 
Cally  spoke  from  her  heart  and  her  fear,  without  greeting,  in  a 
nervous  childish  voice: 

"I  —  I  wanted  to  see  you,  to  —  to  ask  you  —  to  talk  with 
you  —  as  to  what  must  be  done  .  .  ." 

Jack  Dalhousie's  friend  bowed  gravely.  There  was  no  vic 
tory  on  his  face,  neither  was  there  any  judgment. 

"I  understood,"  he  said  simply,  "and  was  grateful  to  you." 

He,  certainly,  seemed  aware  of  no  discordance  in  himself.  He 
advanced  with  a  beautiful  consistency,  looking  as  if  he  wished  to 

272 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

say  more.  But  Cally,  her  hand  gripping  the  back  of  a  spindly 
gold  divan,  her  gaze  fallen,  seemed  suddenly  to  find  her  own 
tongue  unloosed. 

"It's  been  so  terrible,"  she  hurried  on  in  the  same  flat,  unpre 
meditated  way  —  "no  one  could  know.  ...  I  was  in  New  York, 
and  we  were  to  sail  for  Europe  in  a  few  days.  Everything  was 
arranged,  all  our  plans  were  made,  oh,  for  months  and  months. 
And  then  .  .  .  And  now  I  've  come  home  —  and  everything  is  so 
upset  —  and  so  dreadfully  complicated.  And  I  have  n't  seemed 
able  to  think  somehow  —  to  decide  — " 

"Try  not  to  think  about  it  at  all,"  said  the  man,  with  some 
firmness.  "That's  the  great  compensation,  that  you  can  begin 
to  forget  about  it  now.  Won't  you  sit  down?" 

She  sat  down  obediently,  quite  as  if  it  were  natural  for  him  to 
be  taking  charge  of  her  in  her  own  drawing-room.  And  staring 
down  at  her  locked  hands,  she  fluttered  on  with  no  reference 
to  him,  with  a  kind  of  frightened  incredulity,  like  a  bird  in  a 
trap. 

"It  seems  so  unjust  —  so  terribly  unfair.  .  .  .  That  all  this 
could  come  from  one  little  puff  of  wind!  ...  He  had  gotten  out 
of  the  boat.  He  was  swimming  away.  And  then  there  came  one 
little  gust.  I  had  tied  the  sail,  you  see.  He  had  frightened  me. 
And  now,  after  all  these  months  .  .  .  But  of  course  I  never 
thought  —  I  never  dreamed  of  —  of  —  " 

"I  know;  I  understand.  No  one  dreamed  it.  You  must  keep 
sure  of  that,"  said  Vivian,  in  his  natural  voice.  "I  knew  Dal  very 
well  indeed,  you  know;  and  I  felt  certain  that  he  was  —  safe 
from  this.  You  —  you  must  n't  think  of  it  as  something  that 
could  have  been  foreseen.  .  .  ." 

He  was  looking  down  at  her  lowered  face  closely  as  he  spoke; 
and  went  on  without  pause: 

"You  see  —  what  upset  him  so  was  beyond  your  control  or 
mine.  I  've  heard  nothing  since  the  telegram  last  night.  But  — 
you  may  remember  that  he  spoke  of  a  girl  in  his  letter,  whose 
opinion  he  seemed  to  value.  It  must  be  that  when  he  saw  her 
again,  she  was  very  hard  on  him  —  so  hard  that  he  lost  his  grip 
for  a  moment.  I  can't  account  for  it  in  any  other  way.  There  is 

273 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


another  thing,  too.  ...  Do  you  think  it's  a  little  close  in  here, 
perhaps?  May  I  open  a  window?  " 

She  assented  without  speech,  and  he  walked  away  with  the 
step  of  his  disability  to  the  long  windows.  Into  the  dim  great 
room  stole  the  breath  of  the  May  morning,  sweet  with  the  fra 
grance  of  the  balcony  flowers. 

The  tall  young  man  came  walking  back. 

"There  was  one  thing  I  wanted  particularly  to  tell  you.  I  sent 
Dal  a  message  —  a  telegram  —  on  Monday  night.  ..." 

Startled,  Carlisle  looked  up. 

"On  —  Monday?  .  .  .  Why  — I—" 

"Not  breaking  your  confidence,  of  course  —  just  telling  him, 
in  a  general  way,  to  keep  his  courage  up,  that  I  —  I  thought 
good  news  was  on  the  way.  ...  It  was  without  authority.  I 
realized  that.  And  yet  I  felt  so  sure  that  —  when  you  had  had 
a  little  time  to  think  —  that  would  be  what  you  would  wish. 
In  fact,  of  course  I  knew  it.  .  .  ." 

Their  eyes  met,  almost  for  the  first  time,  and  a  sudden  con 
straint  fell  upon  the  girl. 

"But  I  don't  see,"  she  said,  with  some  difficulty  —  "if  you 
telegraphed  him  that  —  on  Monday  —  I  don't  understand  — " 

"The  telegram  went  astray.  I  went  to  the  office  here  last  night 
and  had  them  find  out.  It  should  have  reached  Weymouth  the 
first  thing  yesterday  morning.  It  did  n't  arrive  till  about  three 
in  the  afternoon.  But  even  then  .  .  .  You  see,  he  could  hardly 
have  expected  a  reply  to  his  letter  till  Wednesday.  That 's  to 
day " 

These  two  sat  looking  at  each  other:  and  Cally's  tongue  was 
no  longer  free  as  a  hurt  child's.  She  seemed  not  to  find  it  possible 
to  speak  at  all  now.  The  young  man  from  the  other  world  was 
going  on,  with  his  strange  composure. 

"So  you  see  how  much  was  pure  blind  chance,  that  couldn't 
be  guarded  against.  If  he  had  only  waited.  ...  If  he  had  only 
trusted  you  —  two  hours  longer  ..." 

Surely  he  had  more  to  say,  much  more;  yet  he  ended  abruptly, 
speech  being  evidently  not  desired  of  him.  The  girl  had  suddenly 
dropped  her  face  into  her  hands. 

274 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Cally  did  not  want  to  look  at  this  man  any  more;  could  not 
bear  it  indeed.  His  eyes,  which  had  always  seemed  gifted  to 
convey  hidden  meanings,  had  well  outstripped  the  words  of  his 
mouth,  triumphing  strangely  over  all  that  he  knew  about  her. 
Quite  clearly  they  had  said  to  her  just  then:  "/  would  have 
trusted  you,  you  know.  .  .  ."  And  somehow  that  seemed  sad  to 
her,  she  did  not  know  why.  Why,  indeed,  should  Jack  Dal- 
housie  have  trusted  her?  .  .  . 

Something  moved  in  Cally  in  this  moment  which  might  have 
been  the  still  small  voice,  and  her  weakness  grew  apace.  She 
turned  precipitately,  put  an  arm  on  the  back  of  the  gold  divan 
where  she  sat,  and  buried  her  face  in  it.  Her  struggle  now  was 
against  tears;  and  it  was  to  be  a  losing  struggle.  She  did  not 
cry  easily.  It  always  seemed  rather  like  tearing  loose  some 
thing  within  her,  something  important  that  was  meant  to  stay 
where  it  had  been  fixed.  There  was  pain  with  these  tears.  .  .  . 

The  man  from  the  Dabney  House  said  nothing.  His  was  a 
more  than  woman's  intuition.  There  was  a  long  silence  in  the 
drawing-room.  .  .  . 

But  after  a  time,  when  there  were  signs  that  the  tension  was 
relaxing  and  the  sudden  storm  passing,  he  spoke  in  his  simple 
voice : 

"You  see  your  message  would  have  been  all  that  you  meant, 
but  for  the  terrible  coincidence.  You  must  n't  take  it  —  so  much 
upon  yourself.  That  would  n't  be  right.  Think  of  that  poor  girl 
out  there,  who  is  reproaching  herself  so  to-day.  And  then,  be 
sides,  you  must  know  I  realize  that  I  should  have  seen  you  last 
week.  .  .  .  You  had  every  right  to  expect  that,  as  I  was  —  in  a 
measure  —  Dai's  representative.  ..." 

Cally  hardly  heard  him. 

Her  back  toward  him,  she  had  produced  from  some  recess  a 
small  handkerchief,  and  was  silently  removing  the  traces  of  her 
tears.  She  had  dimly  supposed  that  there  would  be  a  long  discus 
sion;  all  at  once  it  was  clear  that  there  was  nothing  to  discuss. 
And  she  thought  of  Hugo,  and  a  little  of  her  mother,  waiting  up 
stairs.  .  .  . 

"It  was  too  much  for  one  person  to  carry  alone,"  continued 

275 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


the  alien  voice,  sounding  rather  hard-pressed  now.  "  I  happened 
to  be  the  one  person  in  position  to  help,  and  I  failed  you  ...  I  'd 
like  you  to  know  ..." 

But  the  girl  had  risen,  ending  his  speech,  her  need  to  talk  with 
him  past.  Her  self-absorption  was  without  pretence.  Wan  and 
white  and  with  a  redness  about  her  misty  dark  eyes,  she  stood 
facing  the  old  enemy,  and  spoke  in  a  worn  little  voice: 

"You  said  you'd  see  his  father  for  me,  did  n't  you?" 

The  man,  having  risen  with  her,  looked  hurriedly  away. 

"Yes  —  of  course.  I'll  go.  At  once." 

And  then,  as  if  pledged  to  speak,  though  well  he  knew  that 
she  had  no  thought  for  him,  he  added  abruptly:  "But  you 
must  n't  think  of  yourself  as  being  alone  with  this.  I  promise  you 
I'll  keep  the  knowledge,  to  punish  me,  that  if — if  I'd  been  the 
sort  of  man  you  needed,  you'd  have  settled  it  all  long  ago.  ..." 

"That's  absurd  .  .  ."  said  Cally,  somehow  touched,  but  with 
no  conception  of  the  depths  from  which  he  spoke.  ...  "I  never 
meant  to  tell  at  all  if  it  had  n't  been  for  you." 

She  added,  seeing  him  turn  away,  looking  around  the  long 
room:  "I  think  you  must  have  left  it  in  the  hall." 

And  then,  winking  a  little,  she  began  to  blow  her  nose,  and 
moved  away  toward  the  door. 

She  encountered  the  butler,  old  Moses,  entering  from  the  hall. 
There  was  a  yellow  envelope  upon  his  tray,  though  she  had  heard 
no  ring  at  the  bell. 

"Excuse  me,  ma'am.  This  message  just  kem  for  you,  an'  I 
signed  for  it  at  the  do'." 

Carlisle  thought  instantly,  Hugo!  .  .  .  And  when,  having 
quite  forgotten  the  man  standing  silent  behind  her,  she  broke 
open  the  envelope  with  nervous  fingers,  the  hope  of  her  heart  was 
at  once  confirmed: 

Am  coming  to  you.  Arrive  four-ten  this  afternoon.  Wait 
for  me.  H.  C. 

Did  a  tiny  corner  of  her  tightly  closed  mind  open  a  little  as  she 
read?  Wait  for  me.  .  .  . 

276 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


She  turned  back  to  Jack  Dalhousie's  representative  with  some 
thing  like  eagerness,  to  find  his  eyes  fixed  upon  her. 

"Oh!  —  would  it  do  any  harm  to  wait  a  little  while,  do  you 
think?  —  just  till  this  afternoon?" 

"No,  no,"  he  said,  in  rather  an  odd  voice,  "it  will  do  no  harm 
now." 

"Then  I'll  send  word  to  you  this  afternoon  —  at  five  or  six 
o'clock,"  said  Cally,  with  vague  flutterings  of  relief,  of  hope, 
perhaps.  And  then,  moved  by  a  sudden  impulse,  she  added: 
"I  will  tell  you  why  I  want  to  wait.  I  am  engaged  to  be  married. 
I  think  I  should  tell  my  fiance,  before  anything  is  done.  .  .  ." 

To  this  V.  Vivian  made  no  reply.  He  was  advancing  to  the 
door.  And  then  as  he  paused  before  the  stricken  Hun,  and  saw 
the  glitter  of  a  tear  on  the  piquant  gold-and-black  lashes,  the 
young  man's  twisting  heart  seemed  suddenly  to  loosen,  and  he 
said  quite  simply: 

"Won't  you  let  me  say  how  fine  and  brave  a  thing  you're 
doing,  how  splendid  a  — " 

"Don't!"  said  Cally,  recoiling  instantly  from  she  knew  not 
what.  "Don't!  ...  I'm  not  brave  —  at  all!  Oh,  no  — that's 
just  it " 

And  then,  looking  down,  she  added  somewhat  pitifully:  "But 
I  really  did  n't  mean  to  do  anything  so  bad.  ..." 

The  alien  turned  hurriedly  away.  He  went  without  another 
word. 

The  front  door  shut  upon  him.  And  Cally  gave  a  little 
jump,  hearing  above  her  the  imperious  tread  of  her  mother. 


XXI 

That  Day  at  the  Beach,  as  we  sit  and  look  back  at  it;  how  Hugo 
journeys  to  shield  his  Love  from  Harm,  and  Small  Beginnings 
can  end  with  Uproars  and  a  Proverb. 

CANNING  arrived  at  the  House  of  Heth  shortly  after  four. 
He  had  had  an  all-day  journey  in  summer  heat,  and  a  bad 
night  preceding.  In  the  still  watches  following  his  ladies' 
departure  from  New  York,  he  had  had  time  for  calm  reflection, 
nothing  else  but  time;  and  the  more  he  calmly  reflected,  the  less 
could  he  understand  his  betrothed's  singular  desire  to  pay  this 
tribute  to  the  dead.  The  thing  grew  increasingly  mystifying; 
increasingly  unorthodox  and  undependable,  too.  Moreover,  the 
second  thought  reproached  him  that,  Carlisle  being  so  greatly 
upset,  however  unreasonably,  he  himself  should  have  accom 
panied  her  homeward,  in  her  most  need  to  go  by  her  side.  And 
thinking  these  things,  the  disturbed  young  man  had  tumbled  out 
of  bed  in  the  small  hours,  to  make  inquiries  regarding  trains. 

He  was  received  at  the  House  by  his  future  mother-in-law,  who 
was  once  more  the  accredited  intermediary.  Canning  was  hot, 
sooty,  and  suffering  from  want  of  sleep.  There  were  cinders  down 
the  back  of  his  neck.  Mrs.  Heth  had  Moses  prepare  for  him  a 
long  iced  drink,  with  rime  on  the  glass  and  fragrant  mint  atop. 
And  then,  as  the  prize  of  her  lifetime  sat  and  sipped,  she  seated 
herself  beside  him,  her  strong  voice  trembling.  .  .  . 

All  hope  of  discreet  reticence  was  now  ripped  to  shreds.  What 
chance  remained  of  rescuing  the  name  of  Heth  from  the  scanda 
lous  horrors  of  a  suicide  lay  all  in  arousing  this  stalwart  man  to 
the  imminence  of  the  common  peril.  Mrs.  Heth,  somersaulting 
without  hesitancy  from  last  night's  caution,  flooded  the  dark 
places  with  lurid  light. 

Canning  listened  with  consternation  and  chagrin.  His  moral 
sensibilities,  indeed,  received  no  particular  shock,  since  Mrs. 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

Heth's  narrative  frankly  disclaimed  any  wrong-doing  on  Car 
lisle's  part,  but  attributed  the  misunderstanding  to  the  excited 
gossip  at  the  time.  And  by  the  same  token,  he  was  not  unduly 
perturbed  over  the  girl's  hysterical  ideas  of  her  present  duty. 
What  struck  Canning  most  sharply,  indeed,  since  he  was  human, 
was  the  personal  side  of  the  matter:  the  stark  fact  that  important 
developments  touching  Carlisle's  name  and  happiness  had  been 
running  along  for  some  time,  wholly  without  his  knowledge,  but 
under  the  direct  personal  superintendency  of  another  man,  this 
Mr.  Somebody's  unknown  friend.  So  extraordinary  a  course  of 
behavior  seemed  to  reveal  a  totally  new  side  of  his  betrothed, 
hitherto  unsuspected.  Canning  would  have  been  too  saintly 
for  this  earth  if  he  had  not  learned  of  these  proceedings  with  the 
deepest  surprise  and  vexation. 

And  yet  —  what  of  it?  Of  course  there  was  some  simple  and 
natural  explanation,  which  she  would  give  when  she  felt  better 
able.  Doubtless  she  had  been  threatened;  blackmailed  perhaps. 
And  meantime  the  light  thrown  directly  and  indirectly  on  Car 
lisle's  distraught  mood  touched  the  lover  deeply.  He  hardly 
needed  Mrs.  Heth's  frightened  hints  about  the  necessity  of  gen 
tleness  with  firmness  in  dealing  with  a  flare-up.  Had  he  himself 
not  known  the  wilful  nature  of  her  spirit  in  excitement,  that 
never-forgotten  evening  in  the  library? 

And  when  the  striker  of  the  right  note  withdrew  at  last,  and 
Carlisle  herself  appeared  in  the  drawing-room,  very  white  and 
subdued,  the  last  remnant  of  a  personal  grievance  vanished 
from  Canning's  manner.  Nothing  could  have  exceeded  the  ten 
derness  of  his  greeting.  .  .  . 

"Did  my  telegram  surprise  you?"  he  said  presently.  "I  got 
so  troubled  about  you  after  you  were  gone  ...  I  could  n't  bear 
to  leave  you  alone  with  this  ..." 

And  Cally  said,  with  a  quiver  in  her  voice:  "Oh,  Hugo!  .  .  . 
If  you  only  knew  how  I  've  wanted  you  to-day!  ..." 

She  meant  it  with  every  fibre  of  her  being.  Doubly  he  had  con 
vinced  her  now  that  he  could  never  be  shocked  or  disgusted  with 
her,  that  in  him  a  perfect  sympathy  enfolded  her,  covering  all 
mistakes.  That  he  might  not  understand  quite  yet  how  she  felt 

279 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


about  everything  was  possible,  but  that  was  nothing  now,  by 
the  fact  that  he  understood  her,  at  any  rate,  as  mamma  never 
could. 

Some  discussion  of  the  matter  was  of  course  necessary.  And 
presently,  after  they  had  talked  a  little,  quite  naturally,  of  his 
journey  and  how  she  had  slept  last  night,  the  lovers  drifted  on  into 
Mr.  Heth's  little  study,  reopened  against  this  need. 

Here  they  sat  down  and  began  to  talk.  And  here,  in  five  min 
utes,  Carlisle's  heart  began  mysteriously  to  sink  within  her.  .  .  . 

She  had  been  going  through  a  series  of  violent  emotional  expe 
riences  in  which  he  had  had  not  the  slightest  share,  and  now 
required  of  him  that  he  should  catch  up  with  the  results  of  these 
experiences,  upon  a  moment's  notice  and  at  a  single  bound.  She 
could  not  realize  the  extreme  difficulty  of  this  feat.  Nor,  indeed, 
could  Canning  himself,  confident  by  the  ease  with  which  his  love 
had  appeared  to  put  down  all  personal  irritations.  To  his  seem 
ing,  as  to  hers,  they  had  met  in  perfect  spiritual  reunion. 

Accordingly,  when  he  proposed  that  the  matter  be  allowed  to 
rest  quiet  for  a  day  or  two,  till  they  were  all  in  a  little  better 
frame  of  mind  to  view  it  calmly,  he  offered  a  temporary  solution 
which  he  felt  certain  would  seem  to  her  as  reasonable  and  as  tact 
fully  considerate  as  it  did  to  him. 

"In  this  moment  of  shock  and  distress,"  he  said,  with 
admirable  restraint,  "you  are  not  quite  in  the  best  frame  of 
mind,  you  see,  to  decide  such  a  serious  matter.  Fortunately,  to 
wait  a  little  while  and  think  it  over  quietly  can  do  no  harm  to  any 
body  now.  And  then,  if  you  still  feel  the  same  way  about  it,  of 
course  I  shall  want  to  do  what  you  wish." 

He  had  had  Carlisle's  feelings  only  at  second-hand,  through  a 
medium  perhaps  wanting  in  transparence.  Her  hesitancy  con 
siderably  surprised  him.  To  Carlisle,  as  was  almost  equally 
inevitable,  it  was  as  if  in  the  solid  rock  of  their  mutual  under 
standing  there  had  suddenly  appeared  a  tiny  crack.  She  felt  the 
reasonableness  as  well  as  the  tenderness  with  which  Hugo  spoke; 
she  wanted  nothing  in  the  world  but  to  do  what  he  wanted.  And 
yet  it  seemed  somehow  a  physical  impossibility  for  her  now  to  say 
that  she  would  unsettle  and  postpone  it  all,  —  something,  say, 

280 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

as  if  Hugo  had  asked  her  to  step  back  into  last  year  or  the  year 
before.  And  she  tried  to  make  him  understand  this,  saying  — 
what  seemed  a  feeble  reply  to  his  logic: 

"You  see,  I  —  I've  already  thought  about  it  a  good  deal, 
Hugo  .  .  .  And  putting  it  off  would  only  make  me  —  miserable 
and  ill.  I  can't  explain  very  well.  ...  I  think  I  could  begin  to  — 
to  forget  about  it  if  —  when  ..." 

This  she  said  over  several  times,  in  different  ways,  as  the 
necessary  discussion  proceeded.  .  .  . 

It  was  naturally  hard  for  Hugo  to  grasp  the  grounds  on  which 
she  rejected  a  mere  deferment  of  painful  discussion  till  to-morrow 
morning  (for  he  reduced  his  proposal  to  that),  or  even  to  see  why, 
though  opposed  herself,  she  would  not  readily  be  guided  in  so 
small  a  matter  by  his  wishes.  The  soft  chimes  in  the  hall  had 
rung  five  before  it  definitely  came  over  him  that  the  prelimi 
naries  had  oddly,  indeed  incredibly,  gone  against  him. 

He  faced  the  fact  frankly,  without  perceptible  sign  of  annoy 
ance. 

"Well,  then,  my  dearest  girl,  I'm  afraid  we  shall  have  to  talk 
about  it  a  little  now.  ..." 

They  sat  side  by  side  on  papa's  faded  old  lounge,  where  they 
had  spent  many  an  hour  together  in  happier  days.  Canning 
held  Carlisle's  hand  in  a  reassuring  grasp.  Her  heart  warmed  to 
him  anew:  if  he  did  not  quite  seem  to  understand  —  what  wonder 
when  she  hardly  did  herself?  —  his  was  a  love  that  drew  its 
roots  deeper  than  understanding.  Nevertheless  she  flinched  from 
a  discussion  which  promised  to  be  carried  on  chiefly  by  her  over 
strung  nerves;  and  all  at  once  she  felt  that  she  must  know  in 
stantly  what  threatened,  exactly  what  he  thought  about  it. 

"Hugo  ...  do  you  —  don't  you  think  I  —  I  ought  to  tell?" 

Far  readier  and  surer  was  his  voice  in  reply:  "Frankly,  darling, 
I  can't  as  yet  see  any  necessity." 

How  could  he  possibly  see?  —  Ought  to  tell  what?  Had  not  her 
mother  told  him  that  he  had  to  deal  with  the  nightmare  illusions 
of  a  disordered  mind?  .  .  . 

Canning  added  with  great  considerateness:  "I've  thought  it 
all  over  from  every  point  of  view  —  and  you  know  I  'm  better  able 

281 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

to  think  dispassionately  to-day  than  you  are  —  and  I  simply 
can't  persuade  myself  that  we  have  any  such  obligation." 

Carlisle  thought,  with  a  little  hopeful  leap,  that  Hugo  must 
know.  It  was  all  irrevocably  settled;  and  yet  at  the  same  time 
it  may  have  been  that,  woman- wise,  she  had  left  ajar  a  little  door 
somewhere,  through  which  his  man's  wisdom  might  yet  storm, 
and  possess  all.  .  .  . 

"But  —  but  doesn't  it  seem  that  if  I  —  did  him  a  wrong, 
I  ought  to  be  willing  to  set  it  straight?" 

"Well,  naturally!"  said  Canning,  and  smiled  a  little,  sadly,  to 
see  how  white  and  sorrowful-eyed  she  looked.  "If  you  did  him 
a  wrong.  But  that's  just  the  point.  I'm  afraid  I  can't  agree 
with  the  somewhat  extreme  view  this  friend  of  the  poor  fel 
low's  seems  to  have  put  forward.  .  .  .  By  the  way,"  he  added, 
finding  the  natural  question  popping  in  so  suitably  here,  "who 
is  this  man  that  has  talked  with  you  about  it,  Carlisle?  Your 
mother  did  n't  go  into  particulars." 

Carlisle  felt  some  surprise.  "Oh  —  I  supposed  she  told  you. 
Dr.  Vivian  —  you  remember  —  who  ..." 

The  name  took  Canning  completely  aback. 

"Vivian?  —  no!  ...   That  chap!  .  .  ." 

Both  remembered  in  the  same  moment  his  quizzical  complaint 
that  this  man  was  his  hoodoo.  Both  felt  that  the  pleasantry  had 
a  somewhat  gritty  flavor  just  now. 

"I  hadn't  thought  of  him,"  said  Canning,  at  once  putting 
down  his  surprise  and  explaining  it,  "because  I  did  n't  think  you 
knew  him  at  all.  In  fact,  I  did  n't  know  you  'd  ever  seen  him  but 
once,  or  perhaps  twice.  .  .  ." 

Carlisle  regretted  that  mamma  had  not  explained  all  this.  "I 
have  n't  more  than  three  or  four  times.  .  .  .  Twice  when  I  was 
with  you,  you  remember,  and  then  I  met  him  again  at  Mr. 
Beirne's  and  the  Cooneys'  —  some  cousins  of  mine.  You  see  — 
he  was  a  great  friend  of  —  his.  .  .  ." 

"And  I  suppose  he  has  worried  you  about  this  every  time  he 
got  anywhere  near  you?" 

"No,"  Carlisle  answered,  laboriously,  "I  don't  think  he  has 
ever  mentioned  it  —  since  the  first.  Of  course  I ' ve  had  hardly 

282 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


any  conversation  with  him  —  and  it's  always  been  about  the 
Works.  You  know,  I  told  you  he  usually  talked  to  me  about 
that " 

He  said  that  he  remembered;  and  each  was  then  aware  that 
the  harmony  of  a  moment  ago  had  somehow  slipped  away  from 
them.  Canning,  indeed,  instead  of  being  enlightened  by  the  ex 
planation,  was  more  bewildered  than  ever.  How  could  it  be  that 
this  man,  her  father's  assailant  in  the  newspapers,  the  religious 
fellow  whom  Carlisle  had  never  mentioned  but  to  belittle,  should 
have  been  the  recipient  of  intimate  confidences  which  she  had 
withheld  from  him,  her  future  husband?  Naturally  he  could 
not  understand  in  the  least.  However,  glancing  at  her  still  face, 
he  forbore  to  put  another  question. 

"Well,  that's  got  nothing  to  do  with  it  anyway,"  he  said, 
lightly,  dismissing  the  side-issue.  "Now,  let's  see.  ...  Sit  back 
comfortably,  my  dear,  and  we'll  take  it  all  quietly  from  the 
beginning.  ..." 

Hugo  had  got  his  facts  from  Mrs.  Heth,  and  nothing  had 
happened  yet  to  suggest  that  they  were  in  any  way  inaccurate. 
On  the  contrary,  they  seemed  to  have  received  subtle  moral  cor- 
roboration,  so  instinctive  was  it  for  the  lover  to  lean  backward 
from  the  views  foisted  upon  Carlisle  by  her  singular  and  religious 
confidant.  That  he  himself  was  capable  of  coloring  the  case, 
attorney- wise,  to  suit  the  common  interest  did  not  really  cross  his 
mind. 

The  whole  issue  in  the  singular  muddle,  he  pointed  out,  seemed 
to  be  whether  or  not  the  poor  fellow  had  known  that  the  boat 
was  upset.  Well,  who  could  say  what  he  knew,  an  intoxicated 
man  in  a  blind  passion?  Not  Carlisle,  certainly,  plunged  suddenly 
into  the  sea  and  intensely  occupied  with  saving  her  life.  How,  for 
instance,  could  she  know  it  if,  in  the  instant  when  she  was  under 
water,  the  man  had  glanced  back  and  —  deadened  by  his  drunken 
anger,  admit  that  for  him  —  had  not  returned  for  her?  Of  the 
dozens  of  people  who  had  witnessed  the  disaster,  not  one  had 
doubted  that  the  unfortunate  chap's  desertion  of  her  had  been 
deliberate.  .  .  .  However,  imagine  that  it  had  n't  been,  exactly, 
imagine  that  the  women  in  their  excitement  and  resentment,  and 

283 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

through  misunderstanding  of  each  other's  statements,  had  failed 
to  give  him  the  full  benefit  of  the  doubt.  It  was  still  a  great  mis 
take  to  assume  that  what  they  had  said  or  left  unsaid  had  been 
decisive.  Public  opinion,  knowing  the  unstable  character  of  the 
man,  had  already  judged  him.  Did  his  later  life  and  behavior 
indicate,  really,  that  that  judgment  was  far  wrong?  And  as  to 
that  night  of  excitement  long  ago,  the  world's  rough-and-ready 
justice  would  hardly  have  taken  much  account  of  Carlisle's  gen 
erous  theory  that  perhaps  the  man  did  n't  know  what  he  was 
doing.  By  the  same  token,  it  would  scarcely  reopen  the  case 
now  to  admit  that  kind  conjecture.  .  .  . 

"I  honor  from  the  bottom  of  my  heart,  Carlisle,"  said  Canning, 
"your  wish  to  do  the  strictest  justice.  Need  I  say  that  I  'm  with 
you  there,  against  the  world?  But  what  is  the  strictest  justice? 
Perhaps  you  might  bring  a  ray  of  relief  to  the  poor  man's  father, 
and  that 's  all.  Is  that  really  so  great  an  object  to  move  heaven 
and  earth  for,  at  the  cost  of  much  pain  and  distress  to  all  who 
love  you?  ..." 

Having  spoken  at  some  length,  Canning  paused  for  a  reply. 
The  pause  ran  longer  than  he  found  encouraging.  However,  he 
was  no  more  sensitive  to  it,  to  Carlisle's  strange  unresponsiveness 
as  he  talked,  than  was  the  girl  herself.  Indeed,  it  tore  Cally's 
heart  to  seem  to  oppose  her  lover,  pleading  so  strongly  and  sweetly 
for  her  against  herself.  Yet  she  had  several  times  been  tempted 
to  interrupt  him,  so  clear  did  it  seem  to  her  that  he  did  not  un 
derstand  even  now  all  that  she  had  supposed  was  fully  plain  to 
him  last  night. 

She  said  with  marked  nervousness,  and  a  kind  of  eagerness, 
too:  "You're  so  good  and  dear  in  the  way  you  look  at  it,  Hugo. 
You  don't  know  —  how  sweet.  .  .  .  But  it  all  comes  down  to 
whether  he  knew  —  does  n't  it  —  just  as  you  said.  Well,  you  see 
I  really  know  he  did  n't  — " 

"You're  mistaken  there,  my  dear!  Only  God  Almighty  knows 
that.  Don't  you  think  we  had  better  leave  the  judgment  to  him?  " 

That  Canning  spoke  quite  patiently  was  a  great  credit  to  his 
self-control.  His  failure  to  move  her  had  filled  him  with  a  de 
pressing  and  mortifying  surprise.  To  say  nothing  of  the  regard 

284 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

she  might  be  supposed  to  have  for  his  wishes,  he  knew  that  he 
had  spoken  unanswerably. 

"But  you  see  —  I  really  do  know  he  was  n't  such  a  coward, 
Hugo,"  said  Carlisle,  with  the  same  nervous  eagerness  to  accuse 
herself.  "I  —  I  knew  him  quite  well  —  at  one  time.  He  was  a 
wonderful  swimmer,  never  afraid.  .  .  .  Perhaps  it's  only  a  feeling 
—  but,  indeed,  I  know  he  would  n't  have  swum  off  and  left  me  — 
if—" 

"My  dear  girl,  if  you  were  really  so  certain  of  that,  why  did  n't 
you  say  so  at  the  time?  " 

Carlisle,  looking  at  the  floor,  said  wistfully:  "If  I  only  had  .  .  ." 

She  was  acutely  aware  that  his  question  carried  a  new  tone 
into  the  discussion,  that  Hugo  had  criticised  her  for  the  first  time. 
The  tiny  crack  in  their  perfect  understanding  yawned  suddenly 
wider.  And  distressed,  and  pitifully  conscious  that  it  was  all  her 
fault,  Cally  flung  herself  instinctively  across  the  breach.  Her 
gaze  still  lowered,  she  took  Hugo's  hand  and  pressed  it  to  her 
smooth  cheek:  an  endearing  thing,  and  done  with  a  muteness 
more  touching  than  any  speech. 

Canning  was  moved.  She  was  not  demonstrative  by  habit.  He 
kissed  the  cheek,  for  once  almost  as  if  she  were  a  child.  And  he 
said  that  of  course  she  would  have  said  so  that  night,  except 
that  she  had  n't  really  been  certain  of  anything  of  the  sort  then. 
That  feeling  came  now,  born  of  excessive  sympathy  and  nervous 
shock.  The  mistake  would  be  to  accept  these  feelings  for  her  final 
judgment  on  such  a  very  complicated  and  serious  matter. 

So  he  was  arguing  the  case  for  postponement  of  discussion 
once  more,  with  excellent  good  sense  and  an  even  more  moving 
insistence 

If  he  had  now  but  ceased  his  argument,  turned,  gathered  her 
to  his  arms,  and  adjured  her  by  his  overflowing  love  to  entrust 
herself  to  him,  it  is  possible  that  within  two  minutes  he  might 
have  had  her  weeping  on  his  breast,  in  complete  surrender. 
Body  and  soul,  she  was  sore  with  much  pounding:  more  than 
an  hour  ago,  she  needed  sympathy  and  comfort  now,  loverly 
occupation  of  the  desolating  lonely  places  within  her.  But 
Canning  argued,  seeing  nothing  else  to  do,  argued  with  a  deep- 

285 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

ening  note  of  patience  in  his  voice.  And  when  he  stopped  at 
length,  it  was  natural  that  she  should  argue  back:  though  she 
really  meant  this  for  her  last  attempt  to  convey  the  dim  light 
that  was  in  her. 

"I  hate  to  seem  so  silly  and  obstinate,  Hugo.  I  —  I  can't 
seem  to  explain  it  exactly.  But  I  really  don't  think  that  waiting 
would  make  any  difference  —  in  my  feeling.  And  don't  you 
think,  if  I  feel  I  ...  could  n't  be  happy  till  I  —  got  this  off  my 
mind  .  .  ." 

Again  he  explained  that  this  feeling  was  but  a  passing  illu 
sion,  here  to-day,  gone  to-morrow. 

Carlisle  hesitated.  But  Canning,  seeing  only  silence  for  his 
pains,  said  with  a  little  quickening  of  his  tone: 

"Tell  me, my  dear!  Honestly,  would  such  a  thought  as  that — 
about  your  happiness  —  ever  have  occurred  to  you  if  it  had  n't 
been  suggested  to  you  by  Dr.  Vivian?" 

Natural  as  the  inquiry  was  to  Canning,  it  jangled  oddly  upon 
Carlisle.  She  could  not  understand  Hugo's  recurrence  to  this 
man;  it  seemed  curiously  unreasonable,  quite  unlike  him  and 
somehow  quite  unjust.  .  .  . 

"Why,  I  don't  know,  Hugo.  I  —  I  seem  to  have  had  it  on  my 
mind  a  good  deal  lately.  Perhaps  he  first  made  me  think  of  it 
that  way  —  I  don't  know." 

"Don't  you  think  perhaps  we  might  have  understood  each 
other  a  little  better  all  along,  if  you  had  talked  it  over  with  me 
before  you  talked  to  him  about  it?" 

"Yes,  I  do  now.  I  did  n't  seem  to  think  ...  It  all  happened 
so  unexpectedly  —  I  never  planned  anything  at  all.  And  then  I 
thought  —  I  hoped  —  you  would  think  I  was  doing  right." 

"My  dear  girl,  nobody  in  his  senses  could  possibly  think  you 
were  doing  right,  and  nobody  who  cared  for  you  could  want  you 
to  abandon  yourself  to  the  impulses  of  a  moment  of  nervous 
hysteria." 

He  rose  and  paced  the  floor,  four  paces  to  the  room.  A  hand 
some  and  impressive  figure  of  a  man  he  looked,  his  hands 
rammed  into  the  pockets  of  his  beautiful  blue-flannel  coat,  his 
fine  brow  wrinkled  with  a  responsible  frown.  He  was  seven  years 

286 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

older  than  Carlisle,  and,  in  the  absence  of  Mr.  Heth  (whom 
neither  telephone  nor  telegraph,  prayer  nor  fasting,  had  yet  been 
able  to  reach),  he  stood  as  her  lawful  protector  and  the  man  of  her 
family.  He  must  save  her  from  the  effects  of  her  own  hysterical 
moment,  or  nobody  would.  Clearer  and  clearer  it  had  grown  that 
he  had  to  do  with  a  distracted  creature  who,  in  a  state  of  shock, 
had  somehow  passed  under  the  influence  of  a  man  of  the  un 
scrupulous  revivalist  type,  and  upon  whom,  in  her  present  mood, 
all  reasoning  was  thrown  away.  Gentleness  and  firmness  were 
the  notes  for  dealing  with  a  flare-up.  Well,  gentleness  had  been 
tried  in  vain.  .  .  . 

Carlisle  looked  at  Canning  as  he  paced,  in  the  grip  of  a  heart 
sick  fear.  The  same  comfortable,  homely  little  room,  with  tight- 
closed  door;  the  same  evening  sunshine  filtering  in  across  the 
faded  carpet;  the  same  situation,  the  same  man  and  woman. 
But  what  was  this  new  shape  that  peeped  at  her  from  behind  the 
familiar  objects?  A  delusion  and  a  snare  had  been  her  first  feeling 
of  perfect  unity.  But  was  it  conceivable  that  she  and  Hugo 
might  quarrel  ?  .  .  . 

That  was  the  one  thing  that  could  not  be  borne;  anything  to 
avoid  that.  She  must  give  him  his  way,  since  he  would  not  give 
her  hers.  She  must  agree  to  put  it  off  till  to-morrow,  and  then 
to-morrow  he  would  still  think  she  was  unreasonable,  and  so  they 
would  put  it  off  again,  forever.  She  thought  of  Jack  Dalhousie, 
lying  on  his  back,  but  with  open  eyes  which  did  not  cease  to  ques 
tion  her;  of  poor  Dr.  Vivian,  even  now  awaiting  her  word  with 
trusting  eyes  which  did  not  question  anything ;  and  she  saw  that 
to  turn  back  now  would  be  like  a  physical  fracture  somehow,  like 
breaking  her  leg,  and  that  the  moment  she  had^said  she  would, 
she  would  have  to  cry  again,  and  afterwards  she  would  be 
quite  sick.  And  then  she  looked  at  Hugo,  who  was  so  manly  and 
sure,  who  must  be  right,  no  matter  how  she  felt  now:  and  so 
began  to  nerve  herself  to  speak.  .  .  . 

But  Canning  had  a  new  thought,  a  new  argument,  which  now 
became  definite.  Coming  to  a  halt  in  front  of  her,  he  said  in  a 
businesslike  sort  of  way: 

"Let's  see  now.  You  want  to  send  word  to  Dr.  Vivian  this 

287 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

afternoon  that  he  is  to  tell  Colonel  Dalhousie  that  you  feel  you 
did  his  son  an  injustice.  Is  that  it?" 

Checked  in  her  drift  toward  yielding,  Carlisle  said  that  was 
what  she  had  thought. 

"Well,  let's  imagine  what  would  happen  then.  I  said  just  now 
that  for  you  to  do  this  would  accomplish  nothing,  but  it  would  of 
course  raise  a  cloud  of  doubt,  of  which  the  Colonel  would  prob 
ably  make  the  very  most.  He  would  not  be  so  scrupulous  about 
giving  you  the  benefit  of  the  doubt  as  you  feel,  at  the  moment, 
about  giving  it  to  his  son.  He  could  make  a  most  unpleasant 
story  of  it." 

Carlisle  sat  with  lowered  eyes,  listening  to  the  firm  just  tones. 
Very  lovely  and  desirable  she  looked  in  a  "little"  white  dress 
which  Hugo  had  praised  once.  .  .  . 

"And  malice  would  seize  on  this  story  and  make  it  worse  and 
worse  the  further  it  travelled.  If  you  stop  to  think  a  moment, 
you  will  easily  see  what  a  sensation  the  scandalmongers  can 
make  out  of  the  materials  you  ingenuously  wish  to  offer  them." 

He  himself  stopped  to  think;  his  keen  mind  flung  out  little 
exploring  parties  over  the  prospect  he  hinted  at,  and  they  raced 
back  shrieking  with  vulgar  horrors.  Surely,  surely  his  chosen 
bride  could  never  have  contemplated  this. 

"Carlisle,  have  you  reflected  that  you  would  be  pointed  at, 
whispered  about,  till  the  longest  day  you  live?" 

She  sat  motionless,  with  averted  face,  and  felt  that  she  was 
slipping  from  her  last  mooring.  Was  it  conceivable  that  Hugo 
was  persuading  her  to  hush  it  all  up  again  —  just  because  it  was 
easier  ?  .  .  .  She  and  mamma  had  done  that  and  thought  nothing 
of  it.  But,  for  this  moment,  at  least,  it  seemed  horribly  different 
to  have  such  a  thought  about  Hugo.  .  .  . 

She  said  in  a  little  voice:  "But  if  it's  right,  I  ought  n't  to  think 
about  consequences,  ought  I?" 

Canning  groaned. 

"How  many  times  must  I  tell  you  that  it's  not  right,  that  it's 
preposterous,  that  you  yourself  will  say  so  to-morrow!  .  .  ." 

She  made  no  reply,  and  then  Canning,  goaded  on  by  his  sense  of 
strange  impotence,  spoke  the  depths  of  his  secret  resentment: 

288 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Really,  I  should  have  thought  that  the  views  of  your  future 
husband  would  have  more  weight  with  you  than  those  of  a  cas 
ual  medical  missionary,  known  to  be  irresponsible  and  untrust 
worthy." 

Cally  gave  him  a  look  full  of  young  reproach,  rose  with  nervous 
purposelessness,  and  went  over  to  the  empty  hearthside.  Much 
nearer  now  peeped  that  startling  shape.  She  leaned  upon  the 
mantel  and  tried  to  think:  of  her  duty  to  Hugo,  of  how  natural 
it  was  that  he  should  n't  understand,  of  how  all  this  had  begun. 
But  unhappily  the  tone  of  his  last  remark  seemed  to  have  set 
other  chords  quivering  within  her,  and  all  that  she  seemed  able  to 
think  of  was  that  it  was  cruelly  unjust  for  him  to  misjudge  her  so. 
He  had  promised  to  stand  by  her  no  matter  what  happened,  and 
besides  Dr.  Vivian  was  n't  irresponsible  and  untrustworthy.  The 
wild  thought  knocked  that  Hugo,  now  that  he  knew  the  truth 
about  her,  had  ceased  to  love  her.  .  .  . 

"  Carlisle,"  said  Canning,  with  more  restraint,  "  is  n't  it  reason 
able  for  me  to  think  that?" 

Her  reply  showed  some  signs  of  agitation:  "Why,  Hugo  —  of 
course  .  .  .  You  must  know  your  views  have  all  the  weight  in  the 
world  with  me.  His  have  none  ..." 

He  came  up  to  her  on  the  hearthstone,  raised  her  hand,  and 
kissed  the  little  pink  palm. 

"Never  mind  —  I'm  sure  that's  true.  .  .  .  Now,  my  dear,  we 
seem  unable  to  understand  each  other  to-day,  and  trying  to  do  so 
only  throws  us  farther  and  farther  apart.  We  both  need  rest,  and 
time  for  quiet  thought.  You  must  let  me  decide  this  point  for  you. 
I  am  going  to  send  word  to  Dr.  Vivian  now  that  you  will  let  him 
hear  from  you  to-morrow  morning." 

He  released  her  hand,  and  turned  decisively  away.  At  that 
moment,  the  dim  hall  chimes  began  to  strike  six. 

"Oh,  no,  Hugo!  Please  don't,"  she  broke  out,  taking  a  little 
step  after  him.  .  .  .  "Please!  I  don't  think  I  could  bear  it.  .  .  ." 

Canning  wheeled  instantly,  his  virile  face  darkening  and 
flushing. 

"You  don't?  .  .  .  My  views  don't  seem  to  matter  so  tremen 
dously,  after  all!" 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"Ah,  Hugo  dear!  That  hurts.  How—" 

"Tell  me,  Carlisle,  did  the  idea  of  telling  Colonel  Dalhousie, 
for  your  happiness,  originate  with  you  or  with  this  man?" 

Touched  once  more  in  her  spirit  by  his  singular  obsession,  she 
replied,  with  constraint :  "  I  don't  remember,  Hugo.  Perhaps  with 
him.  But  it  was  n't  his  saying  so  that  made  it  true.  It  is  the  way 
I  feel  .  .  ." 

"That  brings  us  back  to  the  beginning  again.  I  have  done  my 
best  to  persuade  you  that  this  feeling  is  an  hallucination." 

Over  and  over  this  ground  they  went  with  quickening  ex 
changes,  Canning's  patience  wearing  sharper  at  each  circuit, 
Carlisle  growing  steadily  whiter,  but  unluckily  not  more  yielding. 
At  last  Canning  said: 

"You  are  going  to  trust  your  whole  future  life  to  me,  Carlisle. 
It  is  hard  for  me  to  grasp  that  you  refuse  to  trust  me  in  this,  the 
first  thing  I  have  ever  asked  of  you.  Tell  me  plainly  that  you 
mean  to  have  no  regard  for  my  wishes." 

Carlisle  felt  ready  to  scream.  How  had  this  miserable  misun 
derstanding  arisen?  What  was  it  all  about?  Her  mind  glanced 
back,  but  she  could  not  remember,  could  not  begin  to  retrace  the 
bewildering  steps.  Worse  yet,  she  hardly  seemed  to  want  to  now, 
for  Hugo  could  not  possibly  speak  to  her  in  this  way  if  he  loved 
her  as  he  had  said. 

She  said  in  a  small,  chilled  voice:  "That's  unjust,  Hugo.  I 
have  every  regard  — " 

"So  you  say,  Carlisle.  But  nothing  else  that  you  say  supports 
it  in  the  slightest." 

The  girl  made  no  reply.  And  then  Canning  struck  out: 

"  My  entreaties  carry  no  weight  with  you,  it  seems.  Well,  then 
I  forbid  you." 

For  the  first  time  a  tinge  of  color  touched  Carlisle's  cheek. 

"You  forbid  me?" 

He  had  no  sooner  said  the  words  than  he  regretted  them.  In 
the  beginning  nothing  of  this  sort  had  been  within  his  dreams; 
had  he  foreseen  the  possibility,  it  is  probable  that  he  would  have 
given  Carlisle  her  head  at  the  start  without  argument.  But,  once 
the  position  taken,  he  could  not  bend  back  his  pride  to  recede. 

290 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


And  to  him,  too,  came  prodding  thoughts,  of  a  bride  who  was 
revealing  strange  sides  of  her  nature,  strange  unlovelinesses 

"Good  God!"  broke  from  him.  "With  such  excessive  consid 
eration  for  two  other  men,  have  n't  you  an  atom  for  the  man  you 
are  to  marry?  Has  n't  it  occurred  to  you  that  in  a  matter  seri 
ously  involving  my  life  as  well  as  yours,  I  have  a  claim,  a  joint 
authority  with  yourself?" 

"Occurred  to  me?  It  has  never  been  out  of  my  mind." 

"Yet  you  resent  it,  it  seems.  I  say  that  I  forbid  your  doing 
something  so  full  of  painful  consequences  to  us  both,  and  you 
show  that  you  resent  it ...  Don't  you?" 

"It's  a  surprise  to  me  that  you  would  want  to  use  your 
authority  in  such  a  way.  But  — " 

"Then  you  must  have  failed  to  grasp  that  this  act  of  folly  you 
contemplate,  over  my  entreaty  and  command,  would  bring  an 
entirely  new  element  into  the  situation  ..." 

Carlisle  looked  at  him  without  shrinking  now.  "A  new  element 
into  the  situation?  I  don't  understand.  How  do  you  mean?" 

"Carlisle!  Be  frank!  You  know  the  effects  of  all  this.  Have 
you  the  right,  when  I  have  sought  one  girl  for  my  wife,  to  offer 
me  quite  another?" 

Pink  deepened  on  the  girl's  cheek. 

"I  don't  think  I  have Well,  Hugo,  you  are  free " 

"Don't  say  that!"  cried  Canning,  in  a  voice  thick  with  a  chaos 
of  feeling.  "It's  unendurable  .  .  ." 

He  turned  abruptly  away. 

Of  the  two,  in  that  disruptive  moment,  Canning  was  far  the 
more  visibly  perturbed.  If  women  think  with  their  emotions, 
Carlisle's  emotions,  rebelling  at  long  overstrain,  had  now  run 
away  with  her.  She  was  never  a  docile  girl,  as  her  mother  well 
knew.  To  Canning  she  had  dealt  the  ultimate  unbelievable 
buffet.  Through  all  her  incredible  obstinacy,  through  all  his 
knowledge  of  the  capabilities  of  her  spirit,  he  had  hardly  doubted 
that  one  hint  of  betrothal  restiveness  would  be  sufficient  to  bring 
her  to  her  knees.  Now  he  seemed  to  wear  her  words  like  a  front 
let,  branded  in  the  mantling  scarlet  of  his  brow.  The  young  man 
felt  himself  falling  through  space.  .  . . 

291 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

The  same  familiar  little  room,  but  now  with  a  new  face.  Twi 
light  began  to  steal  into  it.  On  the  cheerless  hearthside,  the 
lovers  stood,  and  each  knew  that  words  once  spoken  live  forever. 
And  looking  at  each  other's  faces  each  knew,  and  could  not 
change  it,  that  the  lover  was  not  uppermost  in  them  now.  They 
were  two  human  beings  spent  with  long  arguing,  two  wills  hope 
lessly  at  the  clash. 

In  the  sudden  break-up  of  the  trusted  and  reliable,  Canning's 
polished  style  had  been  torn  from  him.  He  owned,  laboriously 
and  at  some  length,  that  this  serious  disagreement  between  them 
was  terribly  disturbing  to  him.  How  would  it  be  later,  if  she 
refused  now  to  show  any  regard  for  his  urgent  requests?  Was  it 
unreasonable  for  him  to  expect  his  chosen  wife  to  consider  the 
responsibilities  entailed  by  his  name  and  position,  to  share  his 
ambition  to  hold  both  above  the  stings  of  malice  and  unmerited 
scandal? 

At  another  moment,  both  the  manner  and  matter  of  Hugo's 
remarks  would  have  touched  Carlisle  profoundly.  But  she  was 
beyond  thinking  of  Hugo  now.  All  that  her  fluttering  heart  could 
feel  was  that  when  he  had  promised  to  stand  by  her  through  all 
time,  he  had  meant  only  to  stand  by  her  as  long  as  she  did  every 
thing  as  he  told  her.  .  .  . 

"No,  Hugo,  it  is  reasonable.  That  is  what  I  say.  I  am  un 
reasonable.  I  don't  seem  able  to  help  it  to-day." 

And  Hugo,  with  the  last  remnant  of  his  unconquerable  in 
credulities,  for  the  twentieth  time  mentioned  another  day.  A 
post-mortem  flicker  of  reargument  started:  started,  but  went 
out,  quickly  extinguished  by  the  perilous  fascination  of  the  per 
sonal.  Unspoken  thoughts  pressed  in  upon  them  as  they  circled, 
lifelessly  reiterating.  These  thoughts  grew  rapidly  louder;  and 
Canning,  striving  to  keep  his  bitter  hostility  from  his  tone, 
gave  voice: 

"Of  course  the  truth  is  —  though  I  am  sure  you  don't  re 
alize  it  yourself  —  this  man  has  somehow  got  you  under  his 
influence  ...  A  sort  of  moral  hypnosis  ...  to  compel  you  to 
do  what  is  against  your  nature  .  .  .  and  will  bring  you  great 
harm." 

292 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

At  what  conceivable  point  had  the  grounds  of  discussion  be 
come  so  completely  metamorphosed? 

"No,  that  is  n't  true.  I'm  not  doing  — " 

"I  suggest  that  in  your  interest .  .  .  Otherwise  I  should  be 
unable  to  account  for  the  predominant  part  you  have  allowed 
him  to  play  in  this." 

"And  yet,  Hugo,  he  was  right  in  saying  that  I  couldn't  be 
happy  if  I  did  n't  tell  the  truth.  And  you  don't  understand  that 
even  now." 

"I  fearj've  always  been  dull  at  these  camp-meeting  meta 
phors." 

Now  they  had  struck  the  greased  road,  and  easy  was  the 
descent  to  Avernus..  Carlisle  said,  all  weakness  gone  from  her: 

"  Well,  I  don't  ask  you  to  understand  any  more.  You  feel  that 
I  'm  not  the  same  girl  — " 

"  I  did  n't  say  that !  I  asked  ...  if  you  had  the  right  —  now  — 
to  make  yourself  a  —  different  girl.  By  that  — " 

"I'm  afraid  I've  already  made  myself  a  different  girl  from 
what  you  thought.  You  knew  that  when  mamma  told  you  what 
I  had  done " 

Why  could  n't  he  say  that  he  wanted  her  twenty  times  over, 
no  matter  what  she  had  done?  It  would  have  been  easy  to  say 
that  half  an  hour  ago.  Canning's  reply  was:  "I've  said  again 
and  again  that  you've  done  nothing.  All  this  malicious  scandal 
cannot  touch  you  unless  you  yourself  wilfully  start  it." 

"You  seem  to  care  less  about  what  I  am,  than  about  what 
people  might  think  I  am.  And  yet,"  she  added,  her  hand  upon 
her  heart  and  her  breath  coming  quicker  and  quicker,  "you 
wonder  that  I  let  somebody  else  tell  me  what  I  am." 

The  deliberate  reference  to  the  revivalist  fellow  stung  Canning 
like  the  flick  of  a  glove  in  his  face. 

"Dr.  Vivian?  He  has  not  my  disadvantage  of  laboring  to  save 
his  affianced's  name  from  everlasting  disgrace." 

"Perhaps  he  does  n't  find  disgrace  where  you  seem  to  look  for 
it." 

"It  is  cheap  to  be  prodigal  with  other  men's  belongings.  What 
is  this  man  to  you?" 

293 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Hugo!  —  Hugo!"  broke  from  her.  "I  can't  bear  this!  .  .  . 
You  must  leave  me." 

"If  I  go,"  said  Canning,  trembling,  "I  do  not  return." 

"It  is  what  I  wish,"  said  Carlisle. 

And  her  other  hand  came  to  her  heart,  to  his  glittering  pledge 
upon  her  finger.  .  .  . 

Canning  stood  watching  her,  paling  and  purpling.  How  they 
had  come  to  this  he  knew  no  more  than  Carlisle;  and  no  more 
than  she  could  he  force  his  steps  backward.  In  truth,  the  deeps 
of  him  had  never  so  passionately  desired  her  as  now,  yearning 
beyond  reason  or  understanding  to  the  untamed  spirit.  And 
yet .  .  .  What  did  he  know  of  her,  whom  he  thought  he  knew  so 
well?  She  had  flirted  with  a  young  drunkard,  fraternized  with  a 
low  crank,  inextricably  involved  herself  in  the  scandals  of  a  sui 
cide.  Taxed  with  these  things,  she  was  wantonly  rebellious,  con 
temptuously  indifferent  to  his  wishes.  Lovely  and  wild  she  stood 
there.  And  yet  .  .  . 

He  heard  his  hoarse  voice  saying:  "Think,  Carlisle.  You  are 
sure  that  this  is  what  you  wish  ..." 

"You  leave  me  no  alternative." 

"Oh,  but  I  have  ...  I  do." 

"Not  one  that  I  can  accept." 

"Then  you  force  me  to  say  good-bye." 

"Good-bye." 

His  legs  could  not  have  heard  the  marching-order;  he  re 
mained  rooted  where  he  stood.  Ebbings  and  Sowings  of  color 
mottled  his  handsome  face. 

"One  last  word  ...  Is  it  to  come  to  this?  We  stand  ...  at  the 
final  parting  of  the  ways.  Think  .  .  .  This  is  what  you  wish?" 

If  he  still  hoped  for  impossible  reconciliation,  or  if  merely  some 
instinct  moved  him  to  put  the  burden  for  the  breaking  upon  her, 
Carlisle  did  not  know.  She  was  past  arguing  now. 

"This  is  yours." 

On  the  pink  palm  he  had  kissed  such  a  little  while  ago  she  held 
out  the  glorious  diamond  he  had  given  her  in  the  first  radiance  of 
the  engagement.  Canning  saw  no  way  of  escaping  the  offering; 
he  accepted  it  with  a  stiff  bow,  dropped  it  in  the  pocket  of  his 

294 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


coat.  But  it  was  a  business  to  which  even  he  quite  failed  to  im 
part  any  dignity. 

He  looked  blindly  about  for  his  hat  and  stick,  remembered  that 
he  had  left  them  outsider  turned  and  faced  his  love  again.  Be 
tween  them  passed  a  long  look. 

"Then  .  .  .  this  is  good-bye." 

"Good-bye,"  said  Cally  again. 

And  then  Hugo  opened  the  door  of  papa's  study  and  went 
away.  And  in  a  moment  there  was  the  sound  of  the  front  door 
shutting. 

Was  it  over,  then?  Was  the  parting  of  lovers  so  brief,  so 
final?  .  .  . 

Cally  started,  as  from  a  trance.  She  ran  out  of  the  study  and 
through  the  dark  library  to  the  drawing-room  and  the  front 
windows.  Just  in  time,  she  stood  behind  the  curtains,  and  caught 
a  last  glimpse  of  Canning's  receding  back.  Brave  and  dear  it 
looked,  departing. 

Over  and  over  she  said  to  herself:  "He's  gone  .  .  .  Hugo's 
gone  .  .  .  He  has  thrown  me  over  ..." 

Gone  was  the  prince  of  lovers.  Calamity  fell  upon  calamity. 
It  would  be  better  to  be  dead.  And  suddenly  all  that  was  hard 
and  resisting  in  the  girl  broke  with  the  taut  strain,  broke  with  a 
poignant  bodily  throe,  and  she  fell  face  downward  into  a  great 
chair,  weeping  with  wild  abandon. 

Here,  within  two  minutes  from  the  shutting  of  the  door,  her 
mother  found  her. 

So  the  beginning  at  the  Beach  touched  its  farther  end.  It 
touched  with  the  shocks  of  cataclysm,  whose  echoes  did  not  soon 
cease  to  reverberate.  The  word  of  the  Lord  came  to  Jack  Dal- 
housie's  father,  and  he  would  not  suffer  in  silence.  Mr.  Heth 
arrived  at  the  House  at  ten  o'clock  that  night;  it  was  the  best  he 
had  been  able  to  do,  but  it  was  too  late  for  a  family  reunion  by 
an  hour.  The  two  women  had  fled  away  to  New  York,  probably 
on  the  very  same  train  that  bore  back  Hugo  Canning.  And  be 
hind  them  Rumor  of  the  triple  head  had  already  risen,  roaring  an 
astonishment  and  a  proverb. 


XXII 

One  summer  in  the  Old  Hotel;  of  the  World's  wagging  on,  Kern 
Garland,  and  Prince  Serge  Suits;  of  how  Kern  leaves  the  Works 
for  Good  and  has  a  Dream  about  Mr.  V.  V.'s  Beautiful  Lady; 
of  how  Mr.  V.  V.  came  to  sit  in  the  still  Watches  and  think  again 
of  John  the  Baptist. 

AND  still  the  world  wagged  on. 
Calamity  befell  one  House  out  of  many,  and  the  natural 
cycles  did  not  stir  a  hair's  breadth.   The  evening  and 
the  morning  were  another  day,  and  another  and  another.   May 
ran  indifferent  out,  with  blue  skies  and  a  maddening  sequence  of 
"Continued  Heat."  Then  presently  the  long  days  had  reached 
their  length,  loitered  awhile,  turned  slowly  backward.  And  June 
had  become  July,  and  midsummer  lay  fast  over  the  half-empty 
town. 

It  was  a  summer  that  broke  records  for  heat,  and  those  fled 
from  it  who  could.  But  in  the  industrious  backwaters  of  towns, 
where  steady  work  means  steady  bread,  it  is  the  custom  of  men  to 
take  the  climate  as  it  comes  to  them,  freezing  or  sweating  at  the 
weather-man's  desire.  Mountain  and  ocean,  awninged  gardens 
and  breeze-swept  deck:  those  solaces  are  not  for  these.  Ninety 
Fahrenheit  it  ran  and  over,  day  after  day,  half  of  June,  half  of 
July.  But  in  the  old  Dabney  House  Mrs.  Garland  stood  on  by 
the  steaming  wash-tubs,  and  Kern  fared  daily  to  the  bunching- 
room  at  Heth's  and  its  air  like  the  breath  of  a  new  bake-oven,  and 
Vivian,  the  doctor,  was  never  "on  his  vacation"  when  his  sick 
called,  and  stout  Mr.  Goldnagel,  week  on  week,  mopped  his  bald 
Hebraic  head  and  repaired  while  you  waited,  with  all  work 
strictly  guaranteed. 

Of  these  four  it  was  the  young  physician  who  kept  the  busiest, 
for  his  work  never  ended.  Falling  back  from  his  brief  appearance 
in  the  upper  world,  he  had  been  speedily  swallowed  again  by  his 

296 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

own  environment.   Routine  flattened  him  out  as  never  before; 
the  problem  of  life  was  to  find  time  to  sleep. 

For  one  thing,  there  was  a  mild  epidemic  of  typhoid  this  sum 
mer,  breaking  out  in  those  quarters  of  the  town  where  moderate 
conveniences  (as  Mrs.  Garland  called  them)  were  matters  of 
hearsay  only,  and  the  efficient  and  undermanned  Health  De 
partment,  fighting  hard,  did  not  have  the  law  to  drive  home 
orders  where  they  would  do  the  most  good.  But  the  doctor  of  the 
Dabney  House  needed  no  epidemic  to  keep  him  occupied,  so 
acceptable  was  his  no-bill  custom  —  still  maintained  —  to  the 
unwell  laity  of  the  vicinage.  Through  the  dingy  waiting-room, 
old  state  bedchamber,  there  rolled  a  waxing  stream,  and  the 
visiting  rounds  of  V.  Vivian,  M.D.,  ran  long  and  overlong. 

Had  these  been  pay  patients,  carriage  trade,  Receipts  would 
have  soared  dizzily  in  these  days,  and  handsome  additions  might 
have  been  made  to  that  Beirne  residue  of  fifteen  thousand  dollars, 
now  lying  useless,  not  even  at  three  per  centum,  in  Mr.  Heth's 
Fourth  National  Bank.  But  here  trooped  only  the  unworthy 
with  unworthy  troubles,  not  always  of  the  body;  the  poor  and  the 
sinful  with  their  acute  complaints;  waiters  and  day-laborers  and 
furtive  sisters  in  sorry  finery,  plumbers'  helpers  with  broken 
heads,  bankrupt  washerwomen,  married  grocer's  clerks  with 
coughs  not  destined  to  stop.  To  these  through  the  sweltering 
days  and  nights,  young  Dr.  Vivian  ministered  according  to  his 
gifts.  They  took  his  pills,  his  bottles  and  his  " treatment";  they 
lauded  but  rarely  took  his  moral  counsel;  and  not  a  few  spoke  of 
loans.  .  .  . 

All  July  the  old  hotel  rang  with  the  blows  of  hammer  and 
the  rasp  of  saw,  in  preparation  for  its  new  birth  in  September, 
as  the  Union  Settlement  House.  There  came  often,  in  the  late 
afternoons,  the  Rev.  George  Dayne,  the  tireless  and  kind-faced 
Secretary  of  Charities,  who  wandered  whistling  over  the  lower 
floor,  while  his  mind's  eye  saw,  beyond  the  litter  of  boards  and 
brick  and  demolished  partitions,  the  emerging  visage  of  a  great 
institution.  And  Mr.  Dayne  rarely  failed  to  climb  the  stairs  for 
a  little  chat  with  the  young  man  in  the  polished  coat  who,  under 
promise  of  secrecy,  had  called  these  wonders  into  being. 

297 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

More  regular  were  the  visits  of  Hon.  Samuel  O'Neill,  desirous 
of  talking  over  the  state  of  the  Union,  particularly  as  touching 
the  new  advanced  labor  law  he  was  now  beginning  to  draft  — 
"stiffest  factory  legislation  ever  passed  in  the  South."  And 
sometimes,  when  the  condition  of  the  sick  permitted  it,  these 
two  would  slip  away  from  the  Dabney  House  for  a  welcome 
swim,  with  a  growing  swarm  of  boys  behind ;  for  Vivian  had  been 
the  best  swimmer  on  the  river  in  his  day,  and  still  did  things  from 
the  springboard  which  many  lads  with  two  sound  feet  could  not 
copy.  So  diversion  from  the  medical  grind  was  not  wanting. 
And  once  in  June,  the  doctor  lunched  with  Mr.  Dayne  at  Berrin- 
ger's,  and  twice  he  was  dragged  off  to  supper  at  the  Cooneys'  and 
enjoyed  himself  very  much,  and  once  he  took  Sunday  dinner  with 
his  aunt,  Mrs.  Mason,  and  his  little  Mason  cousins:  only  that 
time  he  was  called  away  from  the  table  before  dessert,  and  got 
back  to  South  Street  just  a  minute  before  Mrs.  Meeghan  died.  .  .  . 

The  Garlands  rarely  saw  their  boarder  now  except  at  meal 
times,  and  by  no  means  always  then.  Kern,  for  her  part,  was  off 
to  the  Works  at  quarter  to  seven  each  morning,  and  had  stopped 
coming  home  for  dinner  since  the  heat  got  so  bad.  However,  the 
women  observed  him,  and  talked  him  over  of  nights  as  they 
washed  the  dishes  in  the  new  detached  kitchen.  For  the  Garland 
menage  boasted  this  moderate  convenience  now,  directly  attrib 
utable  to  the  remarkable  growth  of  Receipts  (voluntary)  which 
had  reached  $21.75  by  the  book  for  the  single  month  of  June. 
It  was  agreed  that  Mr.  V.  V.  was  not  so  jokey  at  the  supper- 
table  as  formerly,  and  looked  po'ly,  in  fine,  and  no  wonder,  the 
heat  and  all,  and  the  way  he  let  Hazens  and  Epsteins  roust  him 
out  of  bed  in  the  middle  of  his  sleep. 

Kern  deplored  the  doctor's  thinness,  and  hardly  less,  in  her 
secret  heart,  his  strange  indifference  to  his  personal  appearance. 
She  observed  to  her  mommer  that  she  never  see  a  gempman  go  so 
shabby.  She  longed  to  admonish  Mr.  V.  V.  on  some  of  these  mat 
ters,  but  on  the  whole  hardly  saw  her  way  clear.  However,  it  is 
possible  to  do  a  thing  or  two  by  indirection  in  this  world,  as  one 
half  the  race  has  had  good  reason  to  learn.  And  one  sultry  night 
in  mid- July,  the  little  buncher  seemed  able  to  talk  of  nothing 

298 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


but  the  astonishing  suit  Jem  Noonan  had  just  obtained  at  the 
One-Price  Outfitting  Company  for  the  somewhat  laughable  sum 
of  $7.90.  A  three-piece  Prince  serge,  warranted  fast,  with  the 
English  shoulders  and  high-cut  vest,  which  only  last  week  had 
been  $i  5,  for  Jem  had  seen  it  in  the  window  with  his  own  eyes,  but 
had  waited  around,  knowing  that  the  Mid-Summer  Stock  Rejuic- 
ing  Sales  were  now  about  due.  Such  a  Chance  Would  Not  Soon 
Occur  Again :  so  it  said  on  the  card  in  the  window,  and  so  Didy- 
mus  himself  would  have  believed,  hearing  Kern  Garland's  aban 
doned  eulogies.  .  .  . 

And,  sure  enough,  Mr.  V.  V.,  at  length  fired  out  of  his  purely 
civil  interest,  was  visited  with  a  brilliant  association  of  ideas, 
as  his  eye  betrayed.  It  was  a  matter,  it  will  be  remembered, 
which  he  had  always  meant  to  take  up  some  day. 

"Did  you  say  the  One-Price,"  he  inquired,  not  without  an 
inner  sense  of  cleverness  and  enterprise,  "or  was  it  the  Globe?'* 

Kern's  heart  thrilled.  She  was  a  woman,  and  hence  the  mother 
of  all  men.  And  this,  of  course,  was  the  moment  to  introduce 
quite  simply,  the  subject  of  the  Genuine  Mouldform  Garments 
like  the  pixtures  in  the  magazines,  $15,  rejuiced  from  as  high  as 
$28.50,  and  would  look,  oh,  so  fine  and  stylish  long  after  the 
Prince  serge  had  worn  slick  and  faded.  .  .  . 

"But  I  thought  you  spoke  of  the  Prince  as  something  especially 
fine,"  said  Mr.  V.  V.,  with  rather  a  long  face  for  the  way  expenses 
seemed  to  be  mounting  up. 

"  Fine  for  on'y  a  carpenter,  oh,  yes,"  said  Kern,  "  but  not 
hardly  what  you'd  recmend  to  a  doctor,  oh,  no." 

The  young  man  said  ruefully  that  perhaps  he  had  better  in 
vestigate  the  One-Price  bargains,  before  Jem  Noonan  gobbled 
them  all  up.  Then  his  eyes  rested  on  Kern  across  the  table,  and 
the  light  of  enterprise  died  out  of  them.  .  .  . 

To  take  this  child  away  from  the  Heth  Works  would  be  easy, 
indeed,  but  what  to  do  with  her  then?  That  was  a  question  which 
money  could  not  answer.  Kern's  education  had  stopped  at 
twelve.  She  was  nineteen  years  old,  born  to  work,  and  qualified 
to  do  nothing  in  the  world  but  make  cheroots. 

After  all,  could  anything  more  suitable  happen  to  her  than  that 

299 


V.    V.  's     E  y  e  s 


she  should  take  a  fancy  to  Jem  Noonan,  the  upstanding,  square- 
jawed,  taciturn  youth  who  had  appeared  at  the  Dabney  House 
in  his  Sunday  blacks  one  night  in  May,  and  had  reappeared 
regularly  once  a  week  since?  Noonan  was  master  of  his  trade  at 
twenty-one,  a  lodge  man,  an  attendant  at  ward  meetings,  and 
laying  by  money  to  embark  as  a  contractor ;  he  bade  fair  to  be 
a  power  some  day.  And,  though  he  seemed  to  be  almost  com 
pletely  dumb,  there  must  be  something  uncommon  in  him  that 
he  should  be  so  drawn  to  the  gay,  dreaming  little  creature  who 
was  so  clearly  made  of  other  clay  than  his.  .  .  . 

"I  have  n't  seen  Jem  for  some  time,"  said  the  doctor  aloud, 
casually.  "How  are  you  and  he  getting  on  these  days?" 

Kern  gave  an  impish  little  exclamation:  she  never  liked  for 
Mr.  V.  V.  to  mention  Jem. 

"Him  and  me  mostly  get  off!  ...  Him  and  /  mostly  get 
off " 

And  then  she  giggled  briefly,  and  sprang  up  with  eyes  too 
bright  and  went  skipping  and  kicking  for  the  detached  kitchen  to 
see  if  there  was  any  hot  lightbread. 

But  she  flung  over  her  shoulder  as  she  vanished:  "Jem  he 
lacks  'magination.  .  .  ." 

Returning  with  rolls,  the  small  diplomat  reverted  to  the  ques 
tion  of  the  Mouldform  Garment,  which,  it  seemed  to  be  settled, 
Mr.  V.  V.  was  to  purchase  on  the  morrow.  Kern's  endeavor  was 
to  convey  the  idea  that,  in  cases  such  as  this,  many  men  ever  made 
it  a  practice  to  keep  the  old  suit  by,  like  for  rainy  days,  and  under 
no  circumstances  to  give  it  away  to  the  first  person  comes  along 
and  asts  them  for  it.  Clearly  the  reference  here  was  to  her  father, 
the  erring  Mister,  who  had  appeared  at  the  Dabney  House  in 
June's  first  blush  and  was  now  (it  was  presumable)  wearing  Mr. 
V.  V.'s  derby  down  many  a  sunny  lane. 

"And  the  shirts  they  got  at  the  One-Price  Company!"  cooed 
Kern.  "And  the  shoes!  .  .  .  Lor,  them  people 're  givin'  away 
stock  awmost!  ..." 

However,  Mr.  V.  V.  did  not  purchase  shoes  and  shirts  next 
day,  or  even  a  Genuine  Mouldform  Garment.  For  that  day  was 
Tuesday,  July  i7th,  the  day  when  the  professional  mercury  in  the 

300 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

Government  "kiosk"  set  its  new  record,  which  was  like  to  stand 
for  many  years.  One  hundred  and  one  it  announced,  not  with 
out  a  touch  of  pride;  and  that  day  Ours  was  the  hottest  city  in 
the  United  States  (some  said  in  the  world),  and  many  private 
thermometers  showed  one  hundred  and  four,  five,  and  six.  And 
on  that  day  Corinne  Garland  wilted  abruptly  in  the  sickening 
heat,  and  her  tall  machine  at  the  Heth  Works  stood  silent  after 
three  P.M.  .  .  . 

Kern  came  home  and  went  to  bed,  and  suddenly  all  the  cur 
rent  of  life  in  the  Dabney  House  was  changed.  It  was  after  five 
when  Mr.  V.  V.,  returning  from  his  rounds,  heard  the  news,  with 
a  tightening  feeling  around  his  heart,  and  went  down  the  long 
hall  to  see  her. 

The  little  girl  lay  silent,  with  feverish  cheeks,  and  did  not  make 
a  game  of  sticking  out  her  tongue,  which  was  certainly  a  bad 
symptom.  However,  Kern  was  sensitive  with  Mr.  V.  V.;  she 
did  n't  like  to  answer  his  questions,  would  n't  tell  the  truth  in 
fact.  It  took  a  grizzled  gentleman  from  the  other  end  of  town, 
Dr.  Halstead,  late  physician  to  Mr.  Armistead  Beirne,  to  fix  the 
diagnosis  beyond  doubt.  Typhoid,  said  he,  confirming  the  first 
impression  of  his  learned  young  colleague.  Kern  Garland  had 
typhoid. 

Well,  it  was  n't  her  lungs,  at  any  rate,  objects  of  suspicion 
since  the  pleurisy  in  January.  Only  —  only  —  how  had  she 
ever  been  allowed  to  stay  on  at  the  Works  so  long?  .  .  . 

The  little  girl  had  also  a  nervous  constitution,  hardly  fitted  for 
weathering  many  gales.  So  observed  the  grizzled  visitor,  aside. 
And,  glancing  about  the  poor  room  with  its  swaybacked  double 
bed,  he  advised  that  she  be  sent  off  to  a  hospital  without  delay, 
and  so  smiled  cheerily  at  the  small  patient  and  went  chugging 
back  to  his  handsome  house  on  Washington  Street,  having  pooh- 
poohed  all  mention  of  a  fee. 

But  Kern  cried  bitterly  at  the  threat  of  a  hospital,  and  Mr. 
V.  V.  instantly  promised  that  she  should  n't  stir  a  foot  from  where 
she  was.  He  did  n't  mean  that  she  should  suffer  by  it,  either. 
But  it  would  be  a  strange  thing  if  he,  a  resident  physician  with 
the  riches  of  the  world  behind  him  (practically  speaking),  could 

301 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


not  do  all  that  a  hospital  could  do,  and  perhaps  that  little  more 
beside  that  might  make  all  the  difference.  .  .  . 

There  followed  a  day  of  intense  activity,  and  at  the  end  of  that 
time  —  behold  the  power  of  money  in  the  bank,  so  decried  by 
transcendentalists. 

Mrs.  Garland  slept  alone  in  a  new  room  containing  the  sway- 
backed  double  bed,  and  (to  tell  the  truth)  not  one  earthly  thing 
besides.  Kern  slept  in  a  brand-new  single  bed  of  white  iron,  new- 
mattressed  and  sheeted,  and  not  far  away  stood  another  bed 
exactly  like  it.  Beside  Kern's  bed  stood  a  table  holding  glasses 
and  bottled  milk  and  thermometer  and  cracked  ice  and  charts 
and  liquid  diet.  In  one  of  the  windows  stood  three  potted 
geraniums,  growing  nicely  and  bright  red.  Another  window, 
where  the  noonday  sun  shone  in  too  warmly,  was  fitted  with  a 
red-striped  awning;  and  in  a  third  —  for  the  pleasant  old  room, 
at  the  extreme  back  of  the  house,  had  no  less  than  four  of  them 
—  a  baby  electric  fan,  operated  from  a  storage  battery,  ran  musi 
cally  hour  by  hour.  And  through  all  these  marvels  moved  the 
biggest  and  most  incredible  marvel  of  all:  a  lady  in  a  blue-and- 
white  dress  and  long  apron,  with  spectacles  and  a  gentle  voice, 
who  was  paid  twenty-five  dollars  a  week  to  wait  upon  and  give 
sponge  baths  to  her,  Kern  Garland. 

Yes,  you  could  do  something  with  one  thousand  dollars  put 
into  a  checking  account,  and  fourteen  thousand  more  waiting 
behind  that  on  a  certificate  of  deposit.  But  was  it  not  the  irony 
of  life,  was  it  not  life  itself,  that  the  little  buncher,  who  only  the 
other  day  would  have  thrilled  to  her  marrow  at  the  mere  thought 
of  all  these  things,  should  have  won  her  lady's  glories  only  when 
she  was  too  strangely  listless  to  care  for  them?  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Garland  feebly  protested  against  the  doctor's  staggering 
expenditures,  as  in  duty  bound,  but  was  silenced  when  he  told 
her  that,  by  a  lucky  chance,  he  had  a  fund  given  him  by  a  benevo 
lent  relative  for  just  such  cases.  The  doctor  took  advantage  of 
the  interview  to  announce  a  stiff  raise  in  board-charges,  saying,  in 
quite  a  censorious  way,  that  he  had  been  expecting  for  some  time 
to  hear  a  demand  from  her  for  such  an  increase.  As  it  was, 
through  her  failure  to  protect  her  own  interests,  she  and  Kern 

302 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

had  been  doing  the  full  duties  of  an  office-boy  for  him,  doing  them, 
he  might  say,  faithfully  and  well,  without  compensation  of  any 
sort  whatsoever.  This  imposition  must  cease  at  once. 

"Again/'  said  he,  "I am  growing  —  somewhat  heartier.  I  am 
quite  aware  that  I  eat  more.  I  say  that  thirty-five  dollars  a 
month,  and  probably  more,  is  the  proper  amount  for  me  to  pay." 

And  he  said  it  so  sternly,  with  such  a  superior  gempman's  way 
to  him,  that  Mrs.  Garland,  feeling  convicted  of  guilt,  —  and,  to 
tell  the  truth,  missing  Kern's  earnings  sorely,  —  could  only  reply: 
"Just  as  you  say,  sir,  well,  now,  and  thank  you  kindly,  I  'm  sure." 

The  first  excitement  gradually  subsided,  and  the  Dabney 
House  settled  to  the  long  pull.  Days  slipped  by,  all  just  alike. 

Kern's  malady  discouraged  reading  aloud.  It  discouraged 
conversation.  Visitors  were  not  allowed.  But  twice,  without  the 
nurse's  knowledge,  —  Miss  Masters  took  her  rest-time  every 
afternoon  from  three  to  seven,  —  rules  were  suspended  to  admit 
Miss  Sadie  Whirtle,  of  Baird  &  Himmel's,  —  an  enormous, 
snapping,  red-cheeked  girl  she  proved  to  be,  whose  ample  Semitic 
countenance  gave  a  copious  background  for  violet  talcum,  but 
who  said  nothing  wittier  in  Vivian's  hearing  than  "Very  pleased 
to  make  your  acquaintance,  I'm  sure"  —  and  once  to  admit 
Miss  Henrietta  Cooney,  of  Saltman's  bookstore.  Hen  came  by 
from  the  store  late  one  August  afternoon,  having  heard  something 
of  the  case  which  seemed  to  worry  V.  V.  more  than  all  his  others 
put  together.  She  was  allowed  to  spend  twenty  minutes  in  the 
sick-room,  provided  she  did  not  permit  Kern  to  talk.  Having 
faithfully  obeyed  these  instructions,  Henrietta  returned  to  the 
office,  where  the  doctor  sat  in  his  shirt-sleeves,  humped  over 
Miss  Masters's  chart. 

"She's  an  odd  little  thing,"  said  Hen,  "very  cute  and  dear 
with  her  staring  eyes  and  her  yes-ma'ams.  I  was  telling  her  about 
the  Thursday  Germans,  first  explaining  that  a  German  had 
nothing  to  do  with  Germany  —  or  has  it?  You  know  you  told  me 
she  was  wild  about  parties.  She  was  so,  so  interested.  ...  V.  V., 
she's  quite  a  sick  girl,  is  n't  she?" 

"Quite  sick,"  replied  V.  V.  He  glanced  out  of  his  weather 
worn  window,  and  said : "  But  she 's  going  to  be  better  to-morrow." 

303 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Oh!  That's  the  crisis,  or  whatever  you  call  it?" 

He  answered  by  a  nod,  and  Hen  continued: 

"She  never  belonged  in  the  Works,  and  she  certainly  never 
belonged  to  that  fat  woman  with  the  beak  I  met  in  the  hall.  She 's 
a  changeling  —  that's  it.  Speaking  of  the  Works,  V.  V.,  I  had 
quite  a  long  letter  from  Cally  Heth  this  week." 

"Oh!"saidV.V.  "  Oh,  yes!  —  from  Miss  Heth.  Howisshe?" 

Hen,  who  had  been  strolling  about  the  tall  chamber  and  peek 
ing  into  the  instrument  cabinet,  noted  the  young  man's  guarded 
tone;  and  she  wondered  how  many  times  V.  V.  and  her  cousin 
Cally  had  met,  and  what  part  he  had  played  in  all  that  affair,  and 
in  general  what  these  two  thought  of  each  other. 

"Well,  she's  certainly  in  much  better  spirits  than  when  I  had 
the  note  from  her  in  July.  One  thing,  her  answering  my  letters 
at  all  shows  it.  They're  in  Switzerland  now,  at  the  National 
House,  Lucerne,  and  J.  Forsythe  Avery  has  turned  up,  which 
is  a  pretty  good  sign  of  the  times,  I  should  say.  He 's  a  social 
barometer,  you  know,  —  the  last  man  in  the  world  to  turn  up 
where  it  would  hurt  his  position,  whatever  it  is.  It  would  n't 
surprise  me  a  bit  to  hear  some  fine  day  that  Mr.  Canning  had 
sneaked  back,  too,  now  that  the  worst  is  over,  and  was  n't  so 
very  bad  at  that.  There 's  a  man  I  'd  like  to  have  five  minutes' 
talk  with,"  said  Henrietta  Cooney.  "I  think  I'd  give  him  some 
thing  to  put  in  his  memory-book." 

Hen,  having  her  own  theory  of  events,  gave  a  defiant  tug  to 
her  new  sailor-hat.  She  considered  that  she  looked  very  nice 
to-day,  and  she  did.  She,  too,  had  been  patronizing  the  mid 
summer  sales,  and  beside  the  sailor,  she  had  on  a  new  linen  skirt 
which  she  had  got  for  $1.75,  though  the  original  price-mark  was 
still  on  it  and  said  $5. 

"  Cally,"  she  continued,  "wrote  a  good  deal  about  her  mother's 
being  dropped  from  the  officers  of  the  Associated  Charities.  Well 
it's  too  bad,  of  course,  but  somebody's  got  to  take  the  blow, 
V.  V.,  and  I  imagine  it 's  going  about  where  it  belongs.  Serves  her 
right,  I  say,  for  the  sort  of  mother  she 's  always  been,  doing  her 
best  to  educate  all  the  decent  feeling  out  of  Cally,  and  then  trying 
to  break  her  when  she  was  doing  the  best  thing  she  ever  did  in  her 

304 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


life.  In  fact  —  I  don't  want  to  brag,  but  I  expect  the  talk  I  Ve 
spread  around  town  has  had  a  good  deal  to  do  with  the  way  things 
have  gone.  She  married  mother's  brother  and  all  that/'  said  Hen, 
"but  I  detest  and  despise  her  and  always  have." 

V.  V.  burst  out  laughing,  and  Hen  observed:  "Well,  I'm  glad 
I  said  that.  It 's  the  first  smile  I  Ve  seen  from  you  this  month." 

She  stood  by  the  old  secretary,  looking  down  at  him,  and  she 
thought  what  a  hard  life  he  had  down  here,  and  how  his  face 
looked  too  refined  for  this  so  practical  world.  .  .  . 

"Now,  V.  V.,  really,"  said  she,  "why  can't  you  leave  your  work 
to  this  man  Finnegan  for  just  a  week  and  pack  your  little  bag 
and  run  down  to  Aunt  Rose  Hopwood's  farmette  —  really?  Tee 
Wee  and  Loo  are  there,  and  everybody  '11  be  delighted  to  have 
you.  In  the  open  air  all  day,  sleep  ten  hours  every  night,  eat 
your  blessed  head  off.  No  mosquitoes.  No  malaria — " 

"I  can't  go  now,  Hen.  It's  impossible.  Thank  you  just  the 
same." 

He  spoke  quite  irritably,  for  him,  and  Hen,  having  had  this 
subject  up  more  than  once  before,  desisted  and  turned  to  go. 

"Well,  take  some  sort  of  care  of  yourself,  V.  V.,"  she  said  from 
the  door.  "Don't  be  a  goose.  And,  by  the  way,  be  very  gentle 
with  your  little  friend  Corinne.  You  know  she  thinks  you  put 
up  the  moon." 

V.  V.  had  meant  to  be  gentle  with  Corinne,  but  in  the  light  of 
this  remark  he  resolved  to  be  gentler  still.  He  sat  for  ten  minutes 
in  abstraction  after  Henrietta  had  gone;  and  then,  rising  abruptly, 
picked  up  the  chart,  went  down  the  long  hall,  pushed  aside  the 
light  green  curtain  that  swung  in  front  of  a  door,  and  passed  into 
the  sick-room. 

Kern  lay  alone  with  her  geraniums,  awning,  whirring  fan,  and 
other  ladylike  appurtenances.  Mr.  V.  V.  sat  down  by  the  white 
iron  bed  and  introduced  a  thermometer  into  her  mouth.  He  pos 
sessed  himself  of  her  wrist,  took  out  his  silver  watch  and  pres 
ently  wrote  something  on  the  chart.  He  took  out  the  thermom 
eter  and  again  jotted  upon  the  chart.  Then  he  gave  the  patient 
two  tablespoonfuls  of  peptonoids.  All  this  in  silence.  And  then 
Kern  said  in  a  whimpering  little  voice: 

305 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Mr.  V.  V.,  I'm  so  hongry." 

"I  know  it,  poor  child.  Just  a  little  more  patience  now: 
you're  going  to  begin  to  get  better  right  away,  and  before  you 
know  it  you  '11  be  sitting  down  to  the  finest  dinners  that  ever  you 
popped  into  your  mouth.  Ring  the  bell  and  order  what  you  like 
—  stuff,  stuff,  stuff  —  banquets  all  day  long.  And  that  reminds 
me,"  said  he,  hurrying  away  from  this  too  toothsome  subject  — 
"your  holiday,  as  soon  as  you  feel  strong  enough  to  travel.  It's 
high  time  we  were  making  pretty  definite  plans  about  that.  The 
question  is,  what  sort  of  place  do  you  think  you  'd  like  to  go  to?  " 

"Oh!  ...  Do  you  mean  —  any  place  —  go  to  any  place  I 
like?" 

"Any  place  in  the  world,"  replied  Mr.  V.  V.,  the  magnifi 
cent. 

Kern  thought  for  some  time,  her  eyes  on  the  window,  and  then 
said: 

"  I  'd  like  to  go  to  some  place  where  there 's  mountains  and 
a  sea."  She  added,  as  if  to  soften  the  baldness  of  her  specifi 
cations,  the  one  word:  "Like." 

Mr.  V.  V.  thought  of  Marathon,  which  on  the  whole  did  n't 
promise  to  suit.  He  was  visited  with  an  ingenious  idea,  viz. : 
that  Kern  should  go  to  no  less  than  two  places  on  her  convales 
cent  tour,  one  containing  Mountains,  the  other  containing  a  Sea! 
And  so  it  was  settled  to  the  general  satisfaction.  .  .  . 

"Only  hurry  up  and  get  well,"  said  the  tall  doctor,  "or  you'll 
find  the  crowds  gone  from  Atlantic  City  before  you  get  there." 

He  had  risen,  but  paused,  looking  down  at  the  flushed  little 
face  in  which  the  sunken  dark  eyes  looked  bigger  than  ever. 
Thoughts  of  himself  were  in  his  mind;  and  they  were  not  pleas 
ant  thoughts. 

"Kern,"  said  he  —  for  he  had  by  now  fallen  into  the  family 
habit,  abandoning  the  too  stately  Corinne  —  "  suppose  you  were 
absolutely  well,  and  had  a  thousand  dollars,  what  would  you  do 
for  yourself  with  it?" 

It  was  a  game  well  calculated  to  interest  the  little  girl  even 
in  the  listlessness  and  apathy  of  fever.  Kern  spoke  first  of  duck, 
of  French  fried  potatoes  and  salads  rich  with  mayonnaise;  then, 

306 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

hurrying  on  with  increasing  eagerness,  of  taking  a  steamer  to 
Europe  and  buying  her  and  mommer  Persian  clo'es.  .  .  . 

Her  medical  adviser  was  obliged  to  check  these  too  exciting 
flights. 

"I  mean  more  as  a  —  as  an  occupation,"  he  explained.  "You 
know,  of  course,  you've  bunched  your  last  cheroot.  I  was  won 
dering  what  sort  of  nicer  work  you  would  like  to  fit  yourself 
for  —  later  on?" 

Kern  boggled  a  good  deal  over  the  answer  to  this,  but  finally 
got  it  out. 

"What  I'd  truly  like  to  be,  Mr.  V.  V.,  if  I  could,  is  a  writer, 
sort  of." 

"Oh!...  Yes,  yes  —  a  writer!  Well,  that 's  very  nice.  A  very- 
nice  occupation  —  writing." 

The  child  was  encouraged  to  go  on.  Staring  at  him  with  her 
grave  investigatory  eyes,  she  said,  quite  timidly: 

"Mr.  V.  V.,  do  you  think  I  could  ever  be  an  eppig  poet,  sir?  .  .  . 
Like  Homer  the  Blind  Bard,  y'  know?" 

Mr.  V.  V.'s  encouraging  smile  became  a  little  fixed.  Yet  there 
came  nothing  of  a  smirk  into  it,  nothing  the  least  bit  superior. . .  . 
Was  this  the  explanation  of  the  little  girl's  odd  yearning  toward 
pens  and  desks?  How  came  she  to  revere  the  Bard,  where  even  to 
hear  his  name?  Was  it  possible  that  Mrs.  Garland's  changeling 
had  a  spark  in  her,  a  magic  urging  her  on?  ... 

"Epic  poet,  is  it?"  said  he  aloud,  cheerily.  "Oh,  I  daresay 
something  of  the  sort  can  be  arranged.  No  harm  in  having  a  try 
anyhow!  First  thing,  of  course,  is  to  get  a  good  education.  .  .  ." 

And  he  spoke  of  the  High  School,  when  Kern  got  back  from  her 
trip,  with  a  little  brushing-up,  first,  perhaps,  under  his  personal 
supervision.  .  .  . 

And  next  morning,  when  Kern's  temperature  stood  down  a 
whole  degree  at  nine  o'clock,  these  great  plans  seemed  to  come 
nearer  at  a  bound.  That  day  the  Dabney  House  drew  a  long 
breath  and  smiled.  Miss  Masters  was  even  more  confident  than 
Vivian  that  the  hard  corner  had  been  turned.  So  the  verdict 
went  to  Hen  Cooney,  who  telephoned  from  Saltman's;  and  so 
it  went  to  Jem  Noonan,  who  was  to  be  found  waiting  in  front 

307 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


of  the  Dabney  House  every  evening  in  these  days,  silently 
biting  a  Heth  Plantation  Cheroot,  which  he  smoked  because 
Kern  made  them,  though  secretly  preferring  the  White  River 
brand,  made  by  the  Trust.  A  great  capacity  for  waiting  had 
Jem.  And  that  was  the  afternoon  also  that  Doctor  mysteri 
ously  vanished  from  his  office  before  four  o'clock,  having  left 
no  word  where  he  could  be  reached  with  his  office-boy,  Mrs. 
Garland;  and  was  still  out  when  O'Neill  called  at  quarter  to  six, 
to  talk  about  his  factory  law.  .  .  . 

Next  day,  these  novel  excitements  continued.  For  when  Co- 
rinne  Garland  first  opened  her  eyes  that  morning,  they  fell  at 
once  upon  an  imagined  wonder  out  of  fairyland.  There  it  stood 
close  to  her  bed's  head,  shining  gloriously  in  the  early  sun, 
looking,  oh,  so  real.  .  .  .  Kern  lay  extremely  still,  gazing  wide- 
eyed:  for  well  she  knew  the  way  of  dreams,  how  you  forgot  and 
moved  a  little,  and  then  it  all  winked  out.  But  after  a  time, 
when  It  did  not  stir  or  dance  about  at  all,  there  came  to  her  a 
desperate  courage,  and  she  stretched  out  a  trembling  little  hand. 
And  lo,  the  hand  encountered  a  solid  unmistakable.  And  then 
Kern  gave  a  great  gasping  Oh,  and  sat  up  in  bed;  and  presently, 
being  very  weak,  she  began  to  cry,  she  was  so  happy. 

It  really  was  the  prettiest  Writing-Desk  in  the  world,  a  desk  for 
a  duchess's  boudoir,  all  made  of  polished  rosewood,  and  standing 
tall  and  graceful  on  four  curving  legs.  It  had  an  astounding  lid, 
this  Writing-Desk  had,  that  you  either  locked  up  or  let  down; 
and  when  you  let  it  down  the  lid  had  a  shining  slab  of  plate  glass 
all  screwed  on,  thus  becoming  the  loveliest  place  to  write  on 
that  you  could  well  imagine.  And  the  inside  parts  of  the  Desk 
were  running  over  with  delightful  things,  notepaper  and  envel 
opes,  and  pads  and  pencils,  and  new  white  blotting-paper  and  — 
true  as  true,  dull  black,  with  the  cutest  little  silver  belt  —  a 
beautiful  Founting  Pen.  Inside  also  were  pigeonholes  of  the 
best  quality,  like  in  the  Netiquette.  And  in  one  of  the  pigeon 
holes  there  lay,  sure  enough,  a  note;  not,  indeed,  from  a  mus- 
tached  count  with  a  neyeglass,  but  from  one  who  perhaps  seemed 
not  less  of  the  purple  to  the  fevered  little  buncher. 

This  note  was  written  in  the  best  jokey  vein  throughout, 

308 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

beginning,  "Miss  Corinne  Garland,  City  —  Dear  Madam,"  and 
signed,  "Your  most  obliged  and  obedient  servant,  Wri ting- 
Desk.  "  ... 

It  had  been  the  intention  of  Mr.  V.  V.  to  call  personally  at  the 
sick-room  before  breakfast,  to  see  how  Kern  liked  the  arrival  and 
appearance  of  Writing-Desk.  But  Miss  Masters  frustrated  him 
at  the  door,  saying  that  the  child's  heart  was  set  upon  conveying 
her  thanks  by  formal  note,  and  she  had  worried  and  fretted  so 
over  being  refused  that  it  seemed  best  to  give  her  her  way, 
particularly  as  she  did  not  seem  so  well  to-day.  And  in  his  dis 
appointment  over  these  tidings,  the  doctor  presently  forgot  the 
desk  entirely. 

However,  Kern's  note  arrived  in  the  office  an  hour  later, 
through  the  Kindness  of  Miss  Masters,  as  the  envelope  advised. 
Mr.  V.  V.  suspended  a  sentence  to  one  of  his  sick  in  the  middle 
to  read  it: 

MY  DEAR  DR.  VIVIAN: 

Oh,  Mr.  V.  V.,  how  can  I  ever  thank  you  for  given  me  this 
lovely  Writen  Desk.  I  greatly  appreciate  your  kind  gift.  Just 
putten  my  hands  on  it  makes  me  so  happy,  I  could  cry,  oh  the 
soft  feel  this  Pretty  wood  has  got  to  it. 

Your  kind  thought  of  me  at  this  time  has  indeed  pleased  me. 
One  is  never  so  appreciative  of  the  thought  of  one's  friends, 
if  I  can  call  you  my  Friend,  Mr.  V.  V.,  as  when  one  lies  in  pain 
upon  a  sickbed,  th'o  I  have  no  pain.  It 's  the  lovlyest  sweetest 
dearest  Desk  ever  was  Mr.  V.  V.,  and  how  can  me  and  Mom- 
mer  ever  make  up  for  all  you  done  for  us.  I  don't  know.  I 
have  every  hope  for  a  speedy  change  for  the  better  in  my  con 
dition,  and  I  never  dreamed  Id'  have  a  Ladys  Writen  Desk 
truly,  or  haven  one  would  make  me  oh  so  Happy.  My  first 
note,  dear  Dr.  Vivian,  goes  to  you. 

With  repeated  thanks  for  your  considerate  thought  of  me 
during  my  illness,  believe  me,  with  kind  remembrances, 
Yours  very  cordially, 

Your  faithful  friend  CORINNE. 

The  young  man  distributed  mental  italics  as  he  read.  He 
detected  at  sight  the  footprints  of  the  Netiquette  and  Com 
plete  Letter  Writer.  But  he  did  not  smile  once  as  he  read  and 

309 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

reread  the  odd  little  mosaic,  and  folded  it  at  last  and  put  it 
away  in  a  pigeonhole  of  its  own.  No,  his  stabbing  thought  was 
only,  Why  did  n't  I  do  it  all  long  ago?  .  .  .  Why?  .  .  . 

And  similar  things  he  thought  next  morning,  and  the  next  and 
next.  For  Kern  did  not  get  well,  no  matter  what  the  calendar 
said,  no  matter  how  loyally  Writing-Desk  stood  at  her  elbow  to 
serve  her,  as  It  had  said  in  the  Note.  Her  morning  temperature 
shot  up  a  degree  again,  and  there  it  stood  day  after  day,  and 
would  not  go  down.  Kern  obviously  grew  thinner  and  weaker. 
And  there  came  a  day  when  the  President  of  the  Settlement 
Association,  Mr.  Stewart  Byrd,  came  in  person  to  the  Dabney 
House  before  ten  o'clock,  and  sent  all  the  workmen  away.  He 
said  there  must  be  no  noise  about  the  place  that  day.  .  .  . 

That  relapse  passed,  but  no  one  could  say  what  a  day  might 
bring  forth.  The  young  doctor  looked  back  over  the  past;  he 
bowed  beneath  the  burden  that  he  felt  upon  him.  However, 
due  credit  must  be  given  to  his  friend  Samuel  O'Neill  for  as 
sisting  him  to  bring  his  sober  meditations  to  a  focus. 

In  these  days  O'Neill,  having  got  his  stiff  factory  law  drafted, 
was  becoming  concerned  with  the  problem  of  landing  it  on  the 
statute-books.  The  complexion  of  the  incoming  legislature,  which 
met  in  January,  promised  to  be  conservative;  and  the  Commis 
sioner,  breathing  threatenings  and  slaughter  against  the  waist- 
coated  interests  which  had  so  flouted  his  warnings  last  winter, 
had  decided  that  a  preliminary  press  campaign  would  be  needed 
—  beginning,  say,  November  ist  —  to  arouse  public  opinion  to  the 
needs  of  reform.  The  lively  "Chronicle,"  the  "labor  paper," 
offered  space  for  a  series  of  contributed  articles  from  the  Com 
mission  office,  always  provided  that  "hot  stuff"  only  was  fur 
nished,  by  which  was  meant  vigorous,  if  not  libelous,  assaults 
upon  the  existing  order. 

Now  it  became  the  earnest  wish  of  Commissioner  O'Neill 
that  these  hot-stuff  articles  should  be  written  for  him  by  his 
friend  V.  V.,  of  the  reformatory  passions  and  the  pen  of  a 
ready  writer.  And,  the  whole  subject  having  been  discussed 
several  times  in  an  indecisive  sort  of  way,  O'Neill  one  night 
whacked  out  a  jagged  argument. 

310 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"I  had  'em  going  eight  months  ago  —  was  starting  out  for 
Heth's  with  an  axe  —  and  you  asked  me  to  leave  'em  to  you.  I 
thought  you  had  something  —  an  idea.  .  .  .  Say,  V.  V.,  suppose 
we  'd  gone  and  out  bagged  'em  then,  like  I  wanted  —  would  your 
friend  Corinne  be  lyin'  at  death's  door  now?" 

There  was,  indeed,  nothing  precisely  original  in  this  inquiry; 
but,  put  by  another,  and  in  so  bald  a  form,  it  undoubtedly  came 
upon  a  man  somewhat  stark  and  hard.  The  two  men  stood  talk 
ing  on  a  street  corner,  where  they  had  met  by  chance,  and  their 
conversation  here  came  to  an  end.  V.  V.'s  reply  to  Sam's  ques 
tion  was  indefinite,  to  say  the  least  of  it.  He  merely  observed 
that  he  must  be  getting  on  back  to  the  office;  adding  that  he 
did  n't  like  to  be  absent  for  any  length  of  time  just  now.  But 
he  did  n't  say  at  all,  by  that  annoying  habit  of  reserve  he  had, 
whether  or  not  he  would  agree  to  write  the  articles  1  That  was 
what  Samuel  O'Neill  wanted  to  know.  .  .  . 

It  was  September  now,  the  third  night.  At  his  office  the  doctor 
found  two  calls  for  him,  noted  on  a  scrap  of  brown  wrapping- 
paper  in  the  rudimentary  hand  of  Mrs.  Garland.  He  went  out 
again,  disappearing  over  the  Hill  into  that  quarter  of  the  town 
which  was  less  cheering  than  honest  slums.  Returning,  about 
ten,  he  found  the  Dabney  House  entirely  silent:  all  quiet  from 
the  direction  of  the  sick-room.  All  quiet,  too,  in  the  tall  bare 
office.  Very  quiet,  indeed.  .  .  . 

It  was  a  strange-looking  room  to  be  a  doctor's  office;  on  the 
whole  a  strange-looking  young  man  to  be  a  doctor;  no  stereo 
typed  thoughts,  it  may  be,  pounding  through  the  head  he  held  so 
fast  between  his  hands.  Strange  entanglements  were  here,  too, 
with  the  brilliant  life  over  the  Gulf:  a  life  whose  visible  thread,  it 
is  easily  surmised,  will  hardly  lead  us  by  this  ancient  secretary 
again. 

He  was  all  alone  in  the  world;  very  much  so.  His  father  was 
dead;  and  his  mother,  who  had  married  a  penniless  idealist  for 
love,  was  dead  these  many  years.  Fifteen  he  was  when  she  died . . . 
a  long  time  ago.  And  he  had  had  nobody  since.  He  had  just 
been  beginning  to  feel  close  to  his  Uncle  Armistead,  and  now 

3" 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

Uncle  Armistead  was  dead,  too.    And  he  had  no  sisters  or  bro 
thers.  He  had  no  wife  or  children.  .  .  . 

He  was  alone,  and  by  that  token  he  was  free.  No  tie  bound  up 
the  hope  of  others  in  him.  Had  he  felt  the  sting  of  youth's 
rage  to  make  things  better?  No  bond  of  another's  claim  with 
held  him  from  spending  himself  to  the  uttermost. 

All  this  had  long  been  clear.  Long  clear  also  were  the  two, 
paths  trod  by  the  noble  army,  men  and  boys.  There  were  those 
who  preached  a  more  abundant  living;  and  there  were  those  who 
lived  that  living.  ...  A  glorious  thing,  indeed,  it  was  for  a  man 
so  to  go  his  quiet  ways  that  he  became  an  example  and  model  to 
his  fellows,  who  were  made  better  in  that  their  lives  had  touched 
his  exemplary  one.  But  here,  alas,  was  an  aspiration  for  the 
saints,  not  for  weak  men  with  known  bitternesses  and  passions 
in  their  blood,  and  all  youth's  furies  hot  upon  them.  And  surely 
in  that  other  summons  there  was,  besides,  the  thrill  of  romance, 
such  as  the  young  love.  There  was  the  trumpeting  to  high  ad 
venture.  Few  there  were  to  touch,  few  to  remember,  even  the 
saintliest  life  lived  in  a  noble  narrowness,  a  noble  silence.  But 
the  word  of  truth,  spoken  from  no  matter  what  obscurity,  will 
rise  and  ring  round  the  world,  and  remain  forever  in  the  pattern 
of  men's  thought.  Here,  indeed,  was  a  '  bliss  to  die  with,  dim- 
descried.'  .  .  . 

So  it  was  that  one  boy  had  found  his  heroic  ideal,  long  since, 
in  the  grim  voice  crying  in  the  wilderness.  And  in  the  years  the 
secret  picture  had  grown  very  clear,  curiously  full  of  meaning. 
There  was  descried,  like  something  remembered  from  another 
life,  an  innumerable  company  upon  a  rocky  plain,  a  little  river 
rushing  by,  and  in  the  distance  a  City.  .  .  . 

He  had  seen  something  of  life  in  his  time  at  the  medical  school, 
and  before  that,  when  he  was  still  looking  about,  trying  to  decide 
what  he  should  do.  He  had  observed  in  these  days  of  leisure, 
read,  and  burned.  And  he  had  come  back  to  his  old  home-city, 
overflowing  with  fine  passions,  aflame  with  new-old  secrets  and 
forgotten  truths.  What  speeches  there  had  been  to  make  in 
those  days,  what  roaring  things  to  write,  what  shouts  to  be  flung 
from  the  house-tops! 

312 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


And  now  he  had  been  at  home  again  over  a  year;  he  had  been 
right  here  in  the  Dabney  House  a  year  this  month.  And  what 
had  he  done  for  his  faith? 

He  had  done  precisely  what  a  weak  man  does,  precisely  what 
he  had  passionately  resolved  never  to  do.  He  had  found  life  hard, 
and  he  had  compromised  with  it.  A  minute  routine  pressed  upon 
him,  and  he  had  suffered  that  routine  to  swamp  his  perspective, 
to  drown  out  his  fires.  It  was  a  good  and  useful  work  that  he  did: 
he  never  doubted  that.  To  take  the  pain  from  a  sick  body,  to  put 
a  coat  on  a  bare  back,  this  was  worth  a  man's  doing.  But  none 
knew  better  than  he  that  that  body  would  grow  sick  again,  that 
back  once  more  wear  naked:  and  all  the  while  the  untouched 
causes  of  these  wrongs  festered  and  reinfected  and  spread,  and  a 
fig  for  your  Settlements  and  your  redoubled  "  relief."  Was  there 
not  a  bay-tree  that  flourished,  and  had  he  not  been  summoned 
in  a  vision  to  lay  an  axe  to  its  roots?  Behold,  he  gave  his  youth 
to  spraying  at  the  parasites  upon  a  single  small  leaf. 

And  was  it  only  the  grinding  round  of  work  that  had  brought 
him  to  this  compromise?  Was  it  possible  that  personal  considera 
tions  had  seduced  him,  as  Samuel  O'Neill  appeared  to  hint?  That 
would  be  base,  indeed.  .  .  . 

But  no  ...  No,  his  mind,  though  it  seemed  without  mercy 
to-night,  would  acquit  him  of  that.  If  he  had  been  seduced,  it 
was  by  a  voice  in  him,  confused,  it  might  be,  but  strong  neverthe 
less,  and  not  dishonest.  He  had  thought  that  perhaps  people 
could  be  more  gently  acquainted  with  their  responsibilities,  that 
in  their  hearts  they  wanted  to  correct  their  own  mistakes.  He 
had  asked  who  appointed  him  a  judge  over  men.  .  .  . 

And  now  there  were  articles  to  write,  to  publish  in  November, 
to  begin  to  prepare  now.  Hard  articles  they  must  be,  that  broke 
heads  or  hearts,  implied  faiths,  too,  and  did  not  care.  And  in 
the  young  man's  ears  there  rang,  and  would  not  cease,  the  cry  of 
a  girl  in  great  sorrow :  "You  've  never  meant  anything  but  trouble 
to  me  since  the  first  minute  I  saw  you."  .  .  .  And  again,  in  an 
other  voice:  "I  really  didn't  mean  to  do  anything  so  bad."  .  .  . 

As  if  he  had  n't  known  that.  .  .  . 

He  was  alone  in  the  world,  and  by  that  token  he  was  a  lonely 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


man.  He  had  no  mother  or  brother  or  sisters.  He  had  no  wife 
or  children.  .  .  .  No,  nor  would  have  this  side  the  undiscovered 
country.  .  .  . 

Abruptly  the  young  man  rose  from  his  seat  at  the  secretary; 
stood,  pushing  back  his  hair.  Twenty-seven  years  old  he  was, 
a  lame  slum  doctor  in  a  fire-new  suit  of  Prince  serge,  lately 
bought  cheap  at  a  sale;  but  he  had  a  face  that  people  sometimes 
turned  to  look  at  in  the  street. 

And  he  spoke  aloud,  in  a  voice  that  might  have  sounded  queer 
if  there  had  been  anybody  to  hear  it: 

"Don't  I  know  they're  doing  the  best  they  can,  all  the  time? 
Seems  to  me  I  've  had  that  proved  .  .  .  Give  'em  a  chance,  and 
they're  all  good.  .  .  ." 

Far  in  the  stillness  there  sounded  the  sweet  mad  voice  of  the 
Garlands'  clock.  It  struck  seven,  and  then  two,  and  then  fell 
silent.  V.  Vivian  glanced  at  his  watch.  It  seemed  to  be  quarter 
to  twelve,  though  he  did  not  see  how  that  was  possible.  He 
opened  his  office  door,  and  stood  listening.  Presently  he  stepped 
through;  went  walking  without  noise  down  the  long  hall,  which 
was  pitch-black  but  for  a  dim  haze  of  light  just  perceptible 
at  its  extreme  farther  end.  When  he  came  to  this  small  patch, 
the  young  man  lifted  the  curtain,  and  stood  motionless. 

A  single  gaslight  burned  in  the  sick-room,  shaded  with  a  green 
globe  and  turned  down  very  low.  The  electric  fan  was  silent,  and 
the  faint  fever-smell  was  in  the  air.  In  the  nearer  white  bed  the 
nurse  slept,  with  light  snores.  In  the  other,  Kern  Garland  slept, 
lying  almost  at  the  bed's  edge.  One  of  her  arms  had  wandered 
from  the  covers;  the  small  hand  was  curled  about  the  polished 
leg  of  Writing-Desk,  which  was  squeezed  as  close  to  the  bed  as  it 
would  go. 

Vivian  went  in  on  silent  feet.  Presently  he  sat  down  in  his 
accustomed  chair  on  the  farther  side  of  the  bed.  He  stared  fix 
edly  at  the  small  flushed  face,  which  looked  more  elfin  than  ever 
now  that  the  flesh  was  wasting  away.  .  .  . 

What  demerit  had  this  little  girl  that  she  should  be  ordered 
to  give  up  her  health  and  life  only  that  others  might  wear  fine 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

raiment  and  live  in  kings'  houses?  Surely  it  was  not  God  who 
had  laid  that  sentence  upon  her. 

Corinne  Garland  and  the  Heth  Works:  it  was  long  since  these 
two  had  first  seized  his  mind  like  a  watchword.  For  here  was  no 
matter  of  one  small  girl  who  worked  more  hours  than  her  strength 
would  bear;  no  matter  even  of  one  large  factory  which  harnessed 
the  life  of  three  hundred  men  and  women  and  drove  them  over- 
hard.  But  was  not  this  the  perfect  symbol  of  that  preying  of 
the  fortunate  upon  the  unfortunate,  of  that  crushing  inequality 
of  inheritance,  which  reacted  so  deadeningly  upward  and  down 
ward,  and  more  than  anything  else  hobbled  the  feet  of  Man?  By 
one  flagrant  instance,  by  Kern  at  Heth's,  all  the  pitiful  wrong- 
headedness  was  made  plain.  Pinned  forever  to  the  accident  of 
economic  birth,  all  their  energies  sucked  up  by  the  struggle  for 
bread  and  meat,  these  poor  were  mocked  with  bitter  "equality" 
which  did  not  equalize,  but  despoiled  of  all  chance  to  extricate 
themselves  from  their  poverty.  And  their  terrible  revenge  was 
to  spread  their  own  stagnation  upward.  Neither  could  the  rich 
extricate  themselves  from  their  riches.  The  sorriest  thing  in  the 
picture  was  that  they  did  not  desire  to.  Behold  how  blindly  they 
struggled  to  cut  the  brotherly  cord  that  bound  them  to  what  was 
common  and  unclean,  and  that  cord  their  souls'  one  light.  .  .  . 

The  still  young  man  looked  at  the  face  of  his  little  patient,  and 
his  mind  went  back  to  that  day  when  he  and  O'Neill  had  visited 
the  Heth  Works,  last  October,  and  he  had  seen  Kern  at  her 
machine.  He  had  come  back  ablaze,  and  he  had  then  written 
that  Severe  Arraignment  which  Mr.  Heth  had  threatened  to  sue 
the  "Post"  for  publishing,  but  never  had.  .  .  .  And  then  .  .  .  and 
then  he  had  thought  that  perhaps  nothing  so  loud  and  harsh  would 
be  needed.  Hopeful  months  went  by.  Then  trouble  had  come 
to  a  family,  and  he  had  stayed  his  hand  again.  .  .  .  And  now, 
Kern  Garland,  who  was  dear  to  him,  whose  right  and  need  he 
had  failed  to  voice.  .  .  . 

"Oh!  .  .  .  Mr.  V.  V.!" 

Without  warning,  the  little  girl  sat  up  in  bed,  her  cheeks  bright, 
her  eyes  wide  and  shining.  Yet  it  seemed  that  she  had  called 
Mr.  V.  V.'s  name  a  little  before  her  eyes  fell  upon  his  silent  figure. 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Oh,  Mr.  V.  V.!"  she  repeated  in  a  low  eager  voice,  hardly 
above  a  whisper  ...  "I  been  havin'  the  loveliest  dreams!  .  .  ." 

The  young  man  put  out  a  hand  and  pressed  it  firmly  against 
her  hot  forehead. 

"Lie  down,  little  Kern." 

She  lay  down  obediently,  her  face  wearing  a  strange  half-smile. 
Though  her  eyes  were  wide,  her  look  was  that  of  a  person  between 
sleeping  and  waking:  she  showed  no  surprise  at  Mr.  V.  V.'s  being 
there  by  her  bedside. 

"Mr.  V.  V.,  I  had  on  a  white  sating  Persian  dress,  lowneg,  and 
embroidery  and  loops  of  pearls  put  on  all  over  it,  and  white  sat 
ing  pumps,  and  a  fan  all  awstritch  feathers.  I  was  at  a  German 
—  y'know?—  " 

"You  must  n't  talk  now,  Kern.  Put  your  arm  under  the  cover 
and  go  back  to  sleep  — " 

"Lemme,  Mr.  V.  V.!  Please.  It 's  on'y  a  minute  to  tell.  Can't 
I,  sir  ?  ...  I  was  at  a  German,  with  ladies  and  gempmen,  and 
there  was  pink  lights — and  vi'lins  —  and  plants  —  and  little  pre 
sents  they  give  you  for  dancin'  —  and  flowers  —  and  such  lovely 
clo'es!  .  .  .  On'y  I  did  n't  have  a  partner.  Like  a  stag,  y'  know? 
And  then  pretty  soon  I  saw  people  looking  at  me,  and  kep'  on 
looking,  and  one  of  'em  that  looked  somep'n  like  Miss  Masters, 
on'y  it  was  n't  her,  says, '  Wot's  that  girl  a-doin'  here?'  she  says. 
'Why,  she's  a  buncher  down  to  Heth's.'  So  I  walked  on  off  and 
set  down  at  my  Writin'-Desk,  and  made  out  I  did  n't  notice  and 
was  writin'  notes  or  somep'n,  like.  And  then  I  looks  up  and  they 
was  all  coming  over  to  me,  like  sayin'  move  on  now,  and  then  I 
looks  off  again  and  there  was  you  and  Miss  Heth,  settin'  ..." 

Her  listener  was  by  no  means  surprised  at  the  introduction  of 
this  name.  Many  times  had  Kern  spoken  of  her  meeting  with 
Miss  Heth,  that  Sunday  she  took  the  note,  though  Mr.  V.  V.  did 
not  know  that  from  that  day  dated  her  preference  for  white 
dresses,  as  compared  with  red.  .  .  . 

"Settin'  on  a  velvet  settee  you  was,"  whispered  Kern,  her 
hand  picking  at  the  sheet,  "  by  a  founting,  a  boy  with  wings  and  a 
pink  lamp  on  his  head,  pourin'  water  out  of  a  gool'  pitcher.  And 
I  went  runnin'  over  to  you  to  ast  you  must  I  go  —  or  somep'n. 

316 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


And  then  up  comes  all  the  ladies  and  gempmen  and  says, 
"This  girl  don't  belong  here,'  they  says,  'she  must  go  at  once.' 
And  Miss  Heth  she  gets  up  and  says,  'Not  at  all,  this  here  girl  is  a 
friend  of  me  and  Doctor's.'  And  I  says,  'No,  ma'am,  it's  right 
what  they  say,  I  don't  belong  here.'  But  she  says  to  them  to 
leave  me  be.  '  And  do  you,  Co-rinne/  she  says  —  just  that  away, 
like  you  used  to  say  — '  do  you,  Corinne,  come  and  set  on  this  vel 
vet  settee  with  me  and  Doctor,  and  listen  to  this  here  founting 
play.'  And  I  felt  sad  someways  and  I  says,  'Oh,  no,  ma'am,  it's 
all  a  mistake  me  being  here,  and  these  clo'es  mustn't  belong  to  a 
workin'-girl  like  me.  I  might  go  to  school  some  day,'  I  says,  'and 
be  a  writer  sort  of,  mebbe;  but  I  ain't  a  lady,  ma'am,  Miss  Heth, 
no,  nor  never  will  be.'  And  Miss  Heth  she  takes  my  face  between 
her  hands  —  yes,  sir,  she  did,  Mr.  V.  V.,  right  there  before  'em  all 
—  and  she  says,  kind  of  surprised, '  Why,  Co-rinne,  I  thought 
Doctor  he  told  you  long  ago,'  she  says.  'You  been  a  lady  all  the 
time  .  .  .'  And  then  .  .  .  and  then  I  woke  up!  ...  Was  n't  that 
funny?  "  said  Kern.  And  her  face  indicated  that  she  might  have 
told  more,  if  she  had  had  a  mind  to.  ... 

She  lay  staring,  with  parted  lips  and  that  same  remote  half- 
smile,  as  of  one  not  yet  fully  returned  from  fairy  wanderings  in  far 
lands.  She  did  not  seem  to  expect  her  inquiry  to  bring  forth  any 
response  from  the  man  sitting  in  the  shadows,  and  it  did  n't,  so 
far  as  words  went.  Mr.  V.  V.'s  fingers  had  closed  over  her  ex 
posed  wrist;  presently  he  put  the  bony  little  arm  back  under 
the  cover,  rose,  and  went  over  silently  to  the  other  gas-jet  where 
the  little  fixture  was.  The  nurse,  who  had  risen  on  an  elbow 
at  the  first  sound  of  voices,  had  lain  down  again  at  the  young 
man's  signal.  She  did  not  stir  now,  though  perhaps  she  was  not 
asleep. 

Mr.  V.  V.  returned  to  the  bed  with  a  cup  in  his  hand.  Kern 
was  lying  exactly  as  he  had  left  her  —  "  the  wonder  was  not  quite 
yet  gone  from  that  still  look  of  hers." 

"Drink  this,  Kernie.  ..." 

She  drank  incuriously,  with  his  supporting  hand  upon  her 
back;  was  gently  lowered  upon  her  pillow  again;  and  then  she 
turned  upon  her  side,  wide-eyed  still,  but  silent. 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Now,  go  to  sleep.  I  '11  sit  here  by  you.  .  .  ." 

He  noted  the  fact  of  beef-tea  at  twelve-thirty  upon  the  chart, 
and  sat  again  in  the  shadows.  Soon  Kern's  eyelids  drooped,  and 
in  time  she  fell  asleep. 

But  the  doctor  sat  on  in  the  dim  room,  long  after  his  charity 
sick  had  slipped  back  again  to  her  happy  dreams.  And  as  he  sat, 
there  waxed  a  flame  in  him,  and  he  pledged  himself  that  hencefor 
ward  there  should  be  no  pausing,  neither  compassion  nor  com 
punction.  What  mattered  the  troubles  of  individuals?  What 
mattered  himself,  or  that  Duty  to-night  seemed  visaged  like  an 
Iron  Maid?  Here,  indeed,  there  beckoned  him  the  great  good 
task.  The  day  of  the  rocky  plain  and  the  prophet  in  a  loin 
cloth  was  gone;  but  was  there  less  might  in  the  printed  word  and 
the  penny  newspaper?  Spare  this  child,  Lord,  and  the  wrongs 
done  upon  her  shall  not  again  lack  a  voice.  .  .  . 

And  later,  much  later,  when  the  tall  young  man  limped  back 
to  his  desolate  office,  he  did  not  at  once  go  to  bed,  though  the 
small  hours  then  were  fast  growing.  Six  weeks,  and  more,  he 
had  to  write  his  articles  in :  but  there  was  that  in  him  now  which 
would  not  be  denied.  He  sat  again  at  his  old  secretary,  a  cheap 
pad  before  him,  and  the  words  that  ran  from  his  stub  of  a  pen 
cil  were  words  winged  with  fire.  .  .  . 

If  this  was  a  compact  offered,  it  seemed  that  it  had  been  sealed 
in  high  places.  Next  morning,  which  was  the  morning  of  Septem 
ber  4th,  Miss  Masters  came  smiling  to  the  Garland  breakfast- 
table;  and  all  that  day,  for  the  first  time  in  seven  weeks,  Kern's 
temperature  did  not  move  above  103.  On  the  morning  following, 
it  slipped  down  another  half-degree;  on  the  third,  the  same;  and 
on  the  fourth  morning  there  existed  no  reasonable  doubt  that  she 
was  going  to  get  well. 

But  V.  Vivian,  the  doctor,  was  not  one  to  forget  his  mistakes  in 
thanksgiving,  merely  because  the  consequences  had  been  lifted 
from  his  shoulders.  If  he  had  failed  once  to  provide  for  his  little 
friend,  there  should  never  be  any  trouble  on  that  score  again.  So 
he  made  it  all  sure  and  definite  now,  by  the  legal-sounding  paper 
he  drew  up;  and  Henry  Bloom,  the  undertaker  on  the  next  block, 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


who  was  also  a  notary  public,  came  in  and  certified  the  signature. 
And  he  too  declined  his  fee  for  his  trouble,  to  the  wealthy  young 
testator's  perceptible  annoyance.  .  .  . 

That  was  on  September  i2th.  And  next  day  it  was  that  the 
morning  "Post"  informed  all  readers  that  Mrs.  B.  Thornton 
Heth  and  Miss  Heth,  having  just  returned  from  a  summer's 
travel  in  Europe,  had  arrived  in  the  city,  and  were  again  at 
their  town-house,  No.  903  Washington  Street. 


XXIII 

One  Summer  in  Europe,  which  she  never  speaks  of  now;  Home 
again,  with  what  a  difference ;  Novel  Questionings,  as  to  what 
is  a  Friend,  etc. 

IT  was  life's  waggish  way  that  the  project  conceived  in  the 
obscure  dreams  of  an  out-at-elbows  young  man,  and  born 
a  foundling  upon  his  money,  should  have  been  adopted  at 
sight  as  the  spoiled  darling  of  fashion's  ultra-fashionable.  Un 
doubtedly,  astute  Mr.  Dayne  had  had  somewhat  to  do  with  this, 
he  who  so  well  understood  the  connection  between  social  prestige 
and  the  obtainment  of  endowment  funds.  But  whatever  the 
underlying  causes  and  processes,  it  was  plain  that  the  Dabney 
House  Settlement  rode  the  crest  of  the  "exclusive"  wave  this 
autumn.  And  the  fact  was  grasped  by  Mrs.  B.  Thornton  Heth 
within  twenty-four  hours  of  her  home-coming,  so  admirably  was 
it  fitted  to  her  need. 

Mrs.  Heth  had  had  time  enough  through  the  summer,  heaven 
knew,  to  study  out  the  problem  of  restoring  the  family  name 
to  its  former  effulgence,  to  decide  upon  the  family  attitude,  or 
note,  for  the  season  ensuing.  The  note,  already  firmly  struck  in 
her  summer's  letters  to  friends,  —  with  which  she  had  taken 
immense  pains,  knowing  from  herself  how  closely  they  would 
be  scanned,  —  was  that  poor  Carlisle,  shocked  into  hysteria  by 
the  tragedy,  had  magnanimously  blamed  herself  where  she  had 
no  blame  beyond,  perhaps,  youthful  thoughtlessness.  Thus  they 
were  people,  and  in  particular  she  was  a  person,  severely  perse 
cuted  for  righteousness'  sake,  but  resolved  to  bear  it  nobly. 

So  much  for  the  note,  but  a  passive  thing  at  best.  None  saw 
more  clearly  than  Mrs.  Heth  that  a  quietly  resolute  campaign 
of  vindication  was  necessary,  none  more  clearly  that  a  campaign 
meant  money  in  considerable  sums.  If  you  desired  to  prove  any 
thing,  you  must  have  money;  stated  in  another  way,  you  could 

320 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


prove  anything  provided  you  spent  money  enough.  How  best  to 
spend  large  sums  in  this  case? 

Musing  long  upon  the  family  attitude  in  dull  European  days 
and  nights,  the  good  lady  had  gradually  developed  a  complete 
code  of  etiquette,  as  of  funerals.  Thus  she  had  concluded  that 
to  give  an  elaborate  and  superbly  costly  entertainment  —  ordi 
narily  an  unanswerable  act  of  vindication  —  would  under  the 
circumstances  be  "in  bad  taste."  A  series  of  small  but  exclusive 
dinners  would  better  strike  the  note  on  the  entertaining  side; 
while,  as  for  more  public  proof  of  martyrhood  finely  borne,  she  at 
length  decided  that  frank  deeds  of  selfless  charity  would  be  about 
the  proper  thing.  She  had  no  sooner  come  in  touch  again  with  the 
home  atmosphere  than  she  determined  to  give  ten  thousand  dol 
lars,  perfectly  onymously,  to  Mr.  Dayne's  Settlement  House 
Foundation. 

Carlisle  thought  these  developments  odd  enough,  and  indiffer 
ently  pictured  her  mother's  dismay,  if  suddenly  informed  whose 
cause  it  was  she  was  so  enthusiastically  pitching  in  to  help.  For 
it  seemed  that  she  alone  knew  that  the  Settlement  everybody  was 
talking  about  was  not  Mr.  Dayne's  at  all,  but  Dr.  Vivian's,  who 
wished  his  gift  to  be  kept  a  secret.  Carlisle  said  nothing  to  un 
settle  her  mother,  who  possibly  still  thought  that  Hugo  Canning, 
the  gone  but  not  forgotten,  was  the  royal  contributor.  The  girl, 
indeed,  observed  with  relief  that  mamma's  militant  energies 
were  once  more  in  full  swing.  She  had  spent  six  weeks  with  the 
little  lady  when  every  particle  of  fight  had  been  flattened  out  of 
her,  and  that  was  an  experience  she  was  not  anxious  to  repeat. 

Cally  herself  was  glad  to  be  at  home  again,  though  this  was  a 
home-coming  like  none  other  she  had  ever  known.  Four  months' 
use  had  not  robbed  memory  of  its  poignancy,  and  the  moment  of 
arrival  at  the  House  she  found  unexpectedly  painful.  However, 
there  came  at  once  the  remeeting  with  papa,  and  the  first  and 
worst  hour  of  reconnection  with  the  old  life  again  was  lubricated 
with  reunion  and  much  talk. 

Mr.  Heth  had  been  lonely  and  somewhat  depressed  during 
the  summer,  as  his  letters  had  revealed.  But  he  was  unaffect 
edly  happy  at  having  his  wife  and  daughter  back,  and  lingered 

321 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


over  the  breakfast- table  till  nearly  ten  o'clock,  so  much  did  he 
have  to  ask,  and  to  tell,  about  the  summer. 

Of  that  summer  Carlisle  never  afterwards  liked  to  talk.  The 
first  weeks  of  it  always  stood  out  in  her  mind  as  the  most  wretched 
period  of  her  life.  All  spirit,  all  pluck,  all  dignity  and  self-respect 
appeared  to  have  been  crushed  out  by  the  disasters  which  had 
befallen  her.  There  was  absolutely  nothing  left  on  earth  to  be 
thankful  for,  except  that  the  engagement  had  never  been  an^ 
nounced. 

Through  these  days  Cally  had  n't  seemed  to  care  that  Jack 
Dalhousie  had  killed  himself,  had  n't  cared  if  the  constrained  tone 
of  Mattie  Allen's  "  steamer-letter  "  —  which  said  that  Mattie 
was  terribly  sorry,  dear,  but  was  vague  as  to  what  —  indicated 
that  the  Heth  glories  had  undergone  a  great  and  permanent 
eclipse.  All  her  consciousness  seemed  sucked  into  the  great 
ragged  hole  in  her  life  left  by  Canning's  going.  Not  till  now,  it 
seemed,  had  she  realized  to  what  measure  her  prince  of  lovers 
had  twined  himself  into  the  reaches  of  her  being.  To  pluck  him, 
at  a  word,  from  her  heart  would  have  been  a  difficult  task  at  best, 
and  it  was  made  the  more  difficult  for  her  in  that  she  did  not,  at 
first,  put  her  will  into  it.  For  there  had  lingered  in  her  a  sort  of 
stunned  incredulity :  she  could  not  quite  believe  that  their  quarrel 
had  been  irretrievable,  that  Hugo  was  gone  forever.  In  the  four 
days'  waiting  and  hiding  in  New  York,  even  after  she  had  put  the 
ocean  definitely  between  them,  she  multiplied  her  woes  by  keep 
ing  the  small  door  of  hope  constantly  open  against  her  lover's 
possible  return.  And  oh,  how  wretched  she  was  through  these 
days,  how  sorry,  sorry  for  herself! 

And  mamma  was  enormously  sorry  for  herself;  and  there  they 
were,  the  worst  companions  for  each  other  that  could  possibly 
have  been  found  in  the  world.  So  they  had  sat  down  in  London, 
in  a  modest  family-hotel  well  off  the  track  of  tourists  and  of 
fashion;  for  none  knew  better  than  mamma  when  to  draw  the 
purse-strings  tight,  and  the  European  tour,  planned  as  a  trium 
phal  progress,  had  been  abased  to  a  refuge  and  rustication. 

The  average  women  in  such  a  situation  would,  of  course,  quickly 
have  pooled  their  sorrows  for  mutual  comfort;  but  these  two  were 

322 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

fixedly  held  apart  by  their  fundamental  lack  of  sympathy  with 
each  other,.and  further  by  the  disciplinary  character  of  mamma's 
attitude.  Whatever  she  wrote  in  her  letters,  Mrs.  Heth's  personal 
note  was  that  Carlisle  had  wilfully  brought  shame  and  disgrace 
upon  her  ever  indulgent  parents,  and  she  did  not  desire  that  the 
girl  should  be  diverted  for  a  moment  from  the  contemplation  of 
her  errors.  In  their  quiet  quarters,  they  saw  practically  no  one, 
did  nothing  but  make  themselves  and  each  other  as  miserable  as 
they  could.  They  fairly  wallowed  in  their  respective  seas  of  self- 
pity.  And  days  passed  when  they  hardly  exchanged  a  word. 

Of  course  so  abject  a  surrender  to  the  slings  and  arrows  of  out 
rageous  Fortune  could  not  last  indefinitely.  Human  nature's 
safety-valve  is  its  extraordinary  resilience.  Hope  springs  eternal, 
etc.  Nevertheless,  it  took  a  small  shock  or  so  to  arouse  these  two 
women  at  the  mill  from  their  spiritless  prostration.  One  night  in 
early  July,  Carlisle  came  suddenly  upon  the  name  of  Hugo  Can 
ning  in  the  foreign  tattle  column  of  a  London  newspaper.  She 
read,  with  intense  fixity  of  gaze,  that  Hugo  was  in  Europe:  in 
short,  that  Hugo  was  enjoying  himself  at  Trouville,  where  he  was 
constantly  seen  in  the  company  of  the  Honorable  Kitty  Belden, 
second  daughter  of  So-and-So,  and  so  forth.  .  .  . 

All  this  time,  Carlisle  had  been  taking  upon  herself  most  of 
the  blame  for  the  quarrel  and  break.  She  had  been  distracted  and 
unreasonable ;  she  had  never  explained  to  Hugo  sensibly  how  it 
had  all  happened;  it  was  only  natural  that  he  should  have  misun 
derstood  and  misjudged,  and  in  the  end  lost  his  temper  and  said 
hard  things  which  he  did  not  mean.  And  he  was  suffering  by  it  no 
less  than  she:  oh,  be  sure  of  that.  .  .  .  Now,  as  she  sat  alone  in 
her  bedroom,  the  newspaper  crumpled  on  the  floor  beside  her, 
there  seemed  to  fall  scales  from  her  eyes,  and  she  saw  how  bitterly 
she  had  deceived  herself.  Where  was  now  the  love  pledged  to  last 
forever?  Six  weeks  parted  from  her,  and  gaily  gallivanting  at 
the  slipper-toes  of  happier  girls,  whom  the  breath  of  trouble  had 
not  touched. 

Not  even  in  this  moment  did  Carlisle  tax  her  once-betrothed 
with  moral  wrong  in  the  matter  of  the  "telling,"  for  that  whole 
episode  had  remained  in  her  mind  rather  a  flare-up  of  mysterious 

323 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


emotions  than  a  case  of  religious  "  conviction  of  sin  "  and  atone 
ment.  Probably  Hugo  had  said  and  done  what  he  thought  was 
right  then.  But  now  it  was  clear  to  her,  as  by  a  flash,  that  he  had 
done  wrong  in  quite  a  different  way,  that  he  had  committed  the 
deadly  sin  of  love.  He  had  deserted  her  in  the  moment  of  her 
greatest  need  of  him.  At  the  first  pinch  his  boasted  mighty  love 
had  broken  down;  and,  beneath  all  the  disguises,  it  was  such  a 
contemptible  little  pinch  at  that,  only  that  he  was  afraid  of  what 
people  might  say  about  her.  Now  he  stepped  the  beaches  of 
France,  a  squire  of  dames  unconcerned.  Should  she  wear  her 
heart  in  mourning  for  a  light-o'-love  and  a  jilt?  She  would  not. 
She  would  not.  .  .  . 

Easier  said  than  done,  no  doubt.  Yet  Cally's  thoughts  had  at 
least  received  a  powerful  new  twist,  which  is  the  beginning  of 
reconstruction.  And  it  was  only  a  day  or  two  later  that  mamma 
in  her  turn  received  an  arousing  blow,  in  that  debasing  of  her 
by  the  Associated  Charities  which  her  niece-in-law,  Henrietta 
Cooney,  had  mentioned  to  the  Dabney  House. 

As  it  happened  there  came  a  letter  from  Hen  Cooney  by  the 
same  mail  that  brought  mamma's  death-dealing  one  from  Mrs. 
McVey.  For  Hen,  who  had  never  dreamed  of  corresponding  with 
Cally  before,  had  started  up  this  summer  with  a  long  and  quite 
affectionate  steamer-letter,  and  had  since  written  regularly  once  a 
week,  the  newsiest  and  really  the  most  interesting  letters  that  the 
Heths  got  at  all.  This  letter  had  a  private  postscript,  written  on 
a  separate  sheet,  which  said: 

Cally,  I  don't  know  how  you'll  take  it,  but  I  think  I  ought 
to  tell  you  frankly  how  matters  stand.  Of  course  there  was 
plenty  of  talk,  especially  at  first,  and  some  of  it  was  pretty 
strong.  But  whether  you  like  it  or  not,  most  of  the  responsibil 
ity  for  what  happened  is  being  put  on  Aunt  Isabel.  Do  you  re 
member  Mrs.  John  S.  Adkins  who  was  at  the  Beach  the  day 
it  happened?  She  has  told  everybody  it  was  Aunt  Isabel  who 
came  downstairs  and  told  her  and  others  the  story  that  they 
afterwards  repeated.  And  then,  besides,  it  seems  to  be  gener 
ally  understood  that  you  were  the  one  who  wanted  to  straight 
en  things  out  when  you  had  no  idea  it  was  too  late,  and  every- 
324 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

body  whose  opinion  is  worth  having  knows  it  's  easy  enough 
to  slip  into  a  mistake,  but  takes  a  lot  of  spunk  to  stand  up 
and  say  so  long  afterwards.  Good-bye  again. 


Carlisle  removed  this  postscript,  tore  it  into  small  pieces,  and 
put  the  pieces  in  the  waste-basket  under  a  newspaper.  Later  in 
the  afternoon  she  had  to  go  into  her  mother's  bedroom  to  recover 
a  novel  which  the  older  lady  had  abstracted  for  her  own  perusal. 
She  found  her  mother  lying  on  the  bed,  an  open  letter  in  her  hand 
and  on  her  face  the  marks  of  rare  tears. 

Carlisle,  turning  away  with  her  book,  hesitated.  The  two 
women  had  not  spoken  a  word  all  that  day. 

"What's  the  matter,  mamma?"  she  said  constrainedly. 

Mrs.  Heth,  stirring  a  little  on  the  bed,  said,  with  difficulty: 
"The  Associated  Charities  met  to  elect  new  officers.  I  am  — 
omitted  from  the  board."  She  added,  in  a  voice  from  which  she 
could  not  keep  the  self-pity:  "I  should  naturally  —  have  been 
president  this  year." 

Her  crushed  mildness  touched  Carlisle  abruptly.  For  the  first 
time  in  all  this  trouble,  perhaps  for  the  first  time  in  her  life,  she 
had  a  considerate  and  sympathetic  thought  for  her  mother.  It 
was  mamma,  it  seemed,  upon  whom  the  reprisals  of  society  were 
to  fall  most  heavily,  yet  it  was  she,  Cally,  who  had  caused  it  all. 
Suppose  she  had  been  a  good  daughter,  to  begin  with;  suppose 
she  had  even  been  an  obedient  daughter,  and  had  kept  her  own 
counsel,  as  mamma  had  commanded  and  implored.  Ah,  how 
different  would  have  been  this  ghastly  summer!  .  .  . 

She  walked  over  to  the  bed,  quite  pale,  put  her  hand  on  her 
mother's  rumpled  hair,  and  said  with  some  agitation: 

"I'm  very  sorry  to  have  given  you  all  this  trouble,  mamma." 

Mrs.  Heth  looked  up  at  her,  her  small  eyes  winking. 

"Oh  —  I  —  I  'm  sure  you  meant  to  do  what  you  thought  was 
right.  But  —  oh,  Cally!  .  .  ." 

And  then  she  was  weeping  in  her  daughter's  arms. 

Perhaps  the  stout  little  lady  was  ready  now  for  a  reconcilia 
tion.  Perhaps  the  strain  of  silent  censoriousness  had  worn  out 
even  her  strong  will.  Perhaps,  in  some  far  cranny  of  her  practical 

325 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


heart,  there  was  a  spark  which  secretly  admired  Cally  for  her 
suicidal  madness.  At  any  rate,  drying  her  eyes  presently,  she  said: 

"How  Mary  Page  will  gloat  over  this.  .  .  .  Well,  we  can't  go 
on  this  way,  my  child.  We  '11  die  if  we  don't  have  some  diversion. 
Lord  knows  we'll  need  all  our  strength  for  the  fall." 

And  still  later,  she  suddenly  cried:  "LET'S  GO  TO  PARIS!" 

To  Paris  they  went;  and  there,  occupying  more  fashionable 
quarters,  began  to  look  about  for  pleasure.  The  looking  required 
effort  at  first  and  was  scantily  rewarded;  but  of  course  it  was  not 
long  before  the  women's  spirits  responded  to  the  more  hopeful  at 
mosphere.  Soon  they  fell  in  with  some  lively  people  from  home, 
the  Win  tons,  who,  being  a  peg  or  two  lower  than  the  Heths  in  the 
gay  world,  made  it  almost  indelicately  plain  that  they  were  com 
pletely  unaware  of  anything 's  having  happened.  To  Paris  also 
came  J.  Forsythe  Avery. 

And  now,  in  the  passage  of  the  weeks,  the  mother  and  daughter 
were  at  home  again,  with  Carlisle  finding  that  memory  still  had 
power  to  stab,  and  Mrs.  Heth  stoutly  girding  herself  for  the  great 
fight  of  her  life,  and  almost  happy.  .  .  . 

If  it  had  taken  the  violent  break  to  reveal  to  Cally  how  deeply 
Hugo  Canning  had  come  into  her  life,  it  seemed  to  take  this 
home-coming  to  impress  upon  her  how  definitely  he  had  de 
parted.  There  was  hardly  anything  in  the  house  that  was  not  in 
some  way  associated  with  him,  or  with  her  thought  of  him. 
Outdoors  it  was  hardly  better:  wherever  she  turned,  she  found 
mementoes  of  his  absence.  Strange  and  sad  to  think  that  he 
and  she  would  ride  these  familiar  streets  no  more.  He  had  left 
her  alone,  to  find  her  feet  again  in  a  changed  world  as  best  she 
might.  Where  was  he  on  this  day  and  on  this,  with  whom  making 
merry,  her  false  knight  who  could  not  love  as  he  could  fear  the 
world's  opinion?  .  .  . 

It  was  September,  and  people  were  beginning  to  troop  back  in 
numbers  from  the  holiday  places  of  their  desire.  Cally's  first  days 
at  home  were  full  of  meetings,  with  those  now  seen  for  the  first 
time  under  strangely  altered  conditions. 

She  was  not  wanting  in  spirit,  but  she  lacked  her  mother's 
splendid  pachydermousness.  More  than  mamma,  she  had 

326 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

shrunk  from  this  first  painful  plunge,  and  now  that  it  had  come 
she  was  receptive  to  impressions  which  quite  escaped  the  older 
lady.  Outwardly,  indeed,  as  she  perceived  with  some  surprise, 
the  greetings  of  friends  and  acquaintances  were  much  as  they  had 
always  been.  But  she  was  at  once  conscious  of  a  certain  new 
quality  in  people's  looks,  a  certain  hard  exploring  curiosity, 
not  untouched  with  a  fleeting  and  furtive  air  of  triumph.  This 
look  seemed  to  confront  her,  with  varying  degrees  of  emphasis, 
on  nearly  every  face.  To  her  sensitiveness  it  was  as  if,  beneath 
cordial  speech,  everybody  was  really  saying:  "Aha! ...  So 
you  're  the  young  lady  who  hounded  that  chap  into  killing  him 
self  and  got  jilted  for  your  pains.  Well,  well !  Perhaps  you  won't 
be  quite  so  high-and-mighty  after  this.  ..." 

Even  Carlisle's  most  intimate  friends,  try  as  they  doubtless 
did,  seemed  unable  to  help  showing  that  they  considered  her  lot 
in  the  world  sadly  changed.  So,  indeed,  it  was.  Mattie  and  Evey 
could  not,  for  instance,  begin  naturally  by  asking, "  Cally,  did  you 
have  a  lovely  summer?  "  —  when  of  course  they  knew  very  well 
that  she  had  had  a  perfectly  frightful  summer.  Mattie  came  in 
before  eleven  o'clock  on  the  first  morning,  chirping  affectionate 
greetings;  but  neither  then  nor  later  did  she  manage  to  convey 
any  real  sense  of  sympathy  with  Cally,  or  of  understanding 
what  she  had  been  through,  or  even  of  wanting  to  understand. 
Cally  would  have  liked  to  justify  herself  to  Mattie,  to  talk  her 
heart  out  to  her,  or  to  somebody ;  but  Mattie's  idea  was  clearly  to 
keep  Cally's  mind  off  it,  as  you  do  with  the  near  relatives  of  the 
deceased.  And  was  it  possible  that  even  Mats's  sweet  girlishness 
showed  a  subtle  trace  of  confirmation  of  the  Frenchman's  bitter 
maxim,  that  in  the  misfortunes  of  our  friends  there  is  something 
not  altogether  displeasing  to  us?  .  .  . 

If  with  Mats  and  Evey,  so  and  much  more  so  with  others,  less 
genuinely  friendly.  Nobody  took  the  responsibility  of  open  con 
demnation,  as  by  "cutting"  Mrs.  B.  Thornton  Heth  or  her 
daughter.  On  the  other  hand,  nobody  forgot ;  nobody  made  al 
lowances;  nobody  asked  a  single  question.  Judgment  was  obvi 
ously  passed,  and  everybody  seemed  perfectly  clear  about  the 
verdict.  The  Heths  were  people  to  be  treated  with  respect  as 

327 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

long  as  they  kept  their  money,  but  between  you  and  me,  their 
social  fortunes  had  received  a  stain  which  would  not  wear  off. 
Hugo  Canning  had  had  it  exactly  right.  Cally  Heth  would  be 
pointed  at  to  the  longest  day  she  lived.  .  .  . 

Cally,  after  the  first  shrinking,  was  possessed  by  a  sense  of 
anti-climax.  Life  had  a  brassy  ring.  She  had  come  home  with  at 
least  something  of  her  mother's  military  keenness  for  the  "cam 
paign"  of  vindication,  but  within  a  day  or  two  she  was  thinking, 
rather  cynically  and  cheaply,  that  the  game  was  not  worth  the 
candle.  What  difference  did  it  all  make,  in  her  actual  life? 
People  might  whisper  and  nudge  behind  her  back,  but  their  invi 
tations  seemed  to  come  in  much  the  same  as  ever,  poor  mamma 
pouncing  on  each  as  it  came,  with  a  carefully  appraising  eye. 
Was  n't  there  a  hollowness  in  all  this,  something  wanting?  .  .  . 

Untrained  for  analysis  as  she  was,  she  had  not  thought  of  her 
self,  in  the  months  in  Europe,  as  "changed"  exactly.  It  took  this 
recontact  with  the  familiar  environment  to  reveal  to  her  de 
finitely  that  her  experiences  of  the  spring  and  summer  had  not 
rolled  through  her  as  through  an  iron  tube.  Here  were  the  old 
stimuli  (as  scientific  fellows  term  them) ;  but  they  failed  to  bring 
the  old  reactions.  She  was  aware  that  the  elevation  of  the  family 
position,  or  its  rescue,  no  longer  filled  her  whole  horizon.  Old 
values  shifted.  In  particular,  she  found  her  soul  revolting  at  the 
prospect  of  another  season  —  her  fifth  —  another  winter  of  end 
less  parties,  now  with  a  secret  campaign  thrown  in. 

"I'm  tired  of  the  same  old  round,  that's  all,"  she  said, 
moodily.  "I  want  something  new  —  something  different." 

"There's  plenty  that's  new  and  different,  Cally,"  said 
Henrietta  Cooney,  cheerfully,  "if  you  really  want  to  go  in  %>r  it. 
And  ten  times  as  interesting  as  your  old  society.  ..." 

"And  while  I  think  of  it,"  added  Hen,  "I  want  to  book  you 
now  for  Saturday  afternoon,  four-thirty  —  open  meeting  at  the 
Woman's  Club  on  What  Can  We  Do  to  Help  the  Poor.  Don't 
say  no.  This  new  man  Pond 's  going  to  speak,  Director  of  the 
Settlement.  He'll  give  us  something  to  take  home  and  think 
about." 

This  conversation  took  place  on  the  way  home  from  a  meeting 

328 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


of  the  Equal  Suffrage  League,  to  which  Henrietta  had  borne  off 
Cally,  not  so  completely  against  the  latter 's  will  as  you  might  have 
supposed.  And  oddly  enough,  Cally  found  that  she  could  talk 
quite  freely  to  her  poor  cousin,  partly  because  of  Hen's  insignifi 
cance  in  the  gay  world,  partly,  perhaps,  because  of  the  way  she 
had  written  during  the  summer. 

"Are  n't  you  going  to  the  Settlement  opening  on  Thursday?" 

"Can't  get  away  from  the  bookstore  in  time.  Saturday's  a 
short  day,"  said  Hen,  her  eyes  on  space.  .  .  .  "Look  around  you, 
Cally.  You'll  see  lots  more  women  than  you  who 're  sick  of 
parties.  I  tell  you  this  is  the  most  interesting  time  to  be  alive  in 
that  ever  was." 

Cally  smiled  wearily  at  these  enthusiasms.  Nevertheless  she 
could  by  now  understand  at  least  what  Hen  supposed  she  was 
talking  about.  It  was  as  if  the  cataclysm  in  the  May-time  had 
chipped  a  peep-hole  in  the  embracing  sphere  of  her  girlhood's 
round,  and  through  this  hole  she  began  to  discern  novel  proceed 
ings  afoot.  .  .  . 

Strange  talk  was  in  the  air  of  the  old  town  in  those  days, 
strange  things  heard  and  seen.  Not  a  few  women  of  the  happy 
classes  had  grown ' '  sick  of  parties. ' '  They  grew  sick  of  years  lived 
without  serious  purpose,  waiting  for  husband  and  children  which 
sometimes  never  came;  sick  of  their  dependence,  of  their  idleness, 
of  their  careful  segregation  from  the  currents  of  life  about  them. 
They  wearied,  in  short,  of  their  position  of  inferior  human 
worth,  which  some  perceived,  and  others  began  dimly  to  suspect, 
under  that  glittering  cover  of  fictions  which  looked  so  wholly 
noble  till  you  stopped  to  think  (which  women  should  never  do), 
and  dared  to  glance  side  wise  at  the  seams  underneath.  And  now 
lately  some  high-hearted  spirits  had  begun  to  voice  their  sickness, 
courageously  braving  those  penalties  which  society  so  well  knows 
how  to  visit  upon  those  who  disturb  the  accepted  prejudices; 
penalties,  it  might  be,  peculiarly  trying  to  women,  over  which 
some  of  these  supposedly  masculated  pioneers  doubtless  had 
more  than  one  good  cry  in  secret. 

What  could  be  more  interesting  than  the  revolt  of  woman 
against  "chivalry"  in  chivalry's  old  home  and  seat?  That  curi- 

329 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


ous  phenomenon  was  going  on  in  Cally's  town  now,  though 
acuter  social  critics  than  she  had  quite  failed  to  discover  it.  ... 

Far  rumors  of  her  sex's  strange  activities  reached  Cally,  and 
she  listened,  but  with  apathy.  She  marvelled  at  the  freshness  of 
interest  with  which  Mattie  and  Evey  McVey  were  preparing  for 
the  light  routine  which  by  now  they  knew  like  an  old  shoe.  But 
her  own  mood  was  nothing  more  forceful  than  meaningless  rest 
lessness  and  discontent.  Not  even  the  unlooked-for  arrival,  one 
morning,  of  the  dividend  from  the  bank  stock  her  father  had 
given  her  in  May,  all  her  own,  afforded  her  more  than  a  flicker 
of  the  familiar  joys.  How  employ  fifteen  hundred  dollars  so 
that  it  would  bring  her  happiness  now?  Cally,  after  listless  de 
liberation,  took  her  wealth  to  her  father  that  afternoon,  offering 
it  as  a  contribution  toward  mamma's  Settlement  donation.  Her 
impulse  was  hardly  sheer  magnanimity;  still,  it  was  known  that 
finance  was  a  distinctly  live  issue  in  the  House  just  now. 

However,  papa,  after  staring  at  her  a  moment,  merely  gathered 
her  into  his  arms,  check  and  all,  remarking  that  she  was  a  goose; 
and  when  she  tried  to  argue  about  it  a  little,  he  ruled  the  situation 
with  a  strong  paternal  hand.  She  was  to  buy  herself  pretties  with 
that  money,  he  said;  and  there,  there,  he  did  n't  want  to  hear  any 
more  foolishness  about  it.  No  more  Alphonse  and  Gaspard,  as 
the  fellow  said.  .  .  . 

"And,  Cally,"  he  added,  pinching  her  cheek,  "I  want  you  to 
have  a  good  time  this  winter,  remember.  You  can  have  any 
thing  you  want.  Go  everywhere  you  're  invited  —  enjoy  your 
self  with  your  friends  —  have  a  good  time.  D'you  hear  me?" 

She  said  that  she  did:  and  as  she  spoke,  a  bitter  question  rose 
at  her.  Who  were  her  friends?  She  had  always  thought  of  her 
self  as  having  many;  "hosts  of  friends"  had  always  figured 
prominently  in  her  inventories  of  her  blessings.  But  what  was 
a  friend?  Among  all  these  people  she  had  spent  her  life  with, 
there  was  not  one,  it  seemed,  who  cared  to  understand  the  in 
finite  shadings  of  thought  and  impulse  that  had  brought  her  to 
where  she  now  stood;  much  less  one  heart  which  saw  intuitively 

All  the  world's  coarse  thumb 
And  finger  failed  to  plumb  .  .  . 

330 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Papa  was  adding,  with  an  unconscious  frown: 

"The  cash  is  in  the  bank,  if  your  mother  must  have  it.  I'd 
laid  it  by  for  something  else,  though  —  make  some  repairs  at 
the  Works.  Come  in.  ...  I  reckon  I've  staved  off  .  .  ." 

Considered  from  one  angle,  these  fragmentary  words  might 
have  been  illuminating;  but  Cally  did  not  even  hear  them.  At 
that  moment  there  happened  the  unexpected.  The  parlormaid 
Annie  entered,  announcing  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page  to  see  Miss 
Carlisle. 

Surprise  was  expressed  in  the  study.  This  was  the  lady  who 
had  said  that  the  Heths  were  very  improbable  people.  Papa 
opined,  somewhat  glumly,  that  she  had  come  to  beg  funds  for  the 
confounded  Settlement.  Cally,  having  looked  at  herself  in  the 
mirror,  trailed  into  the  drawing-room  with  a  somewhat  cool  and 
challenging  civility. 

But  her  coolness  soon  melted  away,  under  the  visitor's  strange 
but  seemingly  genuine  cordiality.  It  became  clear  that  she  had 
come  in  the  vein  of  amity,  and  without  sinister  motives;  though 
why,  if  not  for  Settlement  funds,  could  not  be  imagined. 

Mrs.  Page  was  a  tall,  pleasant-faced  woman,  still  on  the  right 
side  of  forty,  a  widow  whose  husband  had  left  her  too  much  of 
this  world's  goods  for  her  ever  to  be  classed  as  a  poorhouse  Tory; 
and  despite  the  fact  that  she  was  a  leader  in  the  old-school,  as 
opposed  to  the  brass-band,  set,  many  people  considered  her  a 
very  agreeable  woman.  She  had  amusing  things  to  say,  and  she 
said  them  in  the  Heth  drawing-room  with  no  air  of  awkward 
ness.  Carlisle,  somewhat  against  her  will,  was  soon  thinking 
her  extremely  attractive.  But  the  thawing  out  went  further 
than  that. 

Talk  turned  by  chance  —  or  perhaps  it  was  not  chance 
exactly  —  on  those  growing  currents  of  feminine  activity  which 
had  nothing  to  do  with  dinners  and  dances:  and  here  the  visitor 
expressed  ideas  which  did  not  seem  old-school  in  the  least.  It 
appeared  that  she,  Mary  Page,  in  the  period  of  her  spinsterhood, 
—  for  she  had  n't  been  married  till  she  was  twenty-six,  a 
thoroughgoing  old  maid  in  those  days,  —  had  also  wearied  of 
the  gay  round;  she  had  desired  to  do  something.  But  alas,  she 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


had  suddenly  discovered  that  she  was  n't  fitted  to  do  one 
earthly  thing,  having  been  trained  only  to  be  a  trimming. 
She  said,  smiling,  that  she  had  cried  all  one  day  about  it.  ... 

"Why  is  it  assumed,  really,"  said  she,  "that  women  are  such 
poor  little  butterflies  that  amusing  and  being  amused  should 
absorb  all  their  energies?  I  don't  think  of  myself  as  a  pet,  do 
you,  Miss  Heth?  Give  us  something  solid  to  do,  and  the  world 
would  n't  be  so  full  of  discontented  women.  Do  you  know,  if  I 
had  a  daughter,"  said  Mrs.  Page,  "and  she  was  n't  married  after 
three  years  'out,'  and  hadn't  developed  any  special  talent,  I 
should  send  her  straight  down  to  Hartman's  Business  College, 
and  have  her  learn  typewriting.  Yes,  I  should!  —  and  make  her 
get  a  place  in  an  office,  too,  at  five  dollars  a  week!  ..." 

The  distinguished  visitor  remained  twenty  minutes  in  the  im 
probable  drawing-room,  and  contrived  to  make  herself  interest 
ing.  When  she  rose  to  go,  she  mentioned  that  she  was  staying  at 
her  mother's  place  in  the  country  till  after  Thanksgiving,  and 
was  only  in  town  for  the  day.  And  then,  as  she  held  out  her  hand, 
smiling  in  a  simple  and  friendly  way,  her  expression  changed,  and 
she  brought  up  her  other  hand  and  laid  it  over  Carlisle's. 

"My  dear,"  she  began,  with  some  embarrassment,  "I  wonder 
if  you  will  let  a  much  older  woman  say  how  truly  she  has  sym 
pathized  with  you  in  —  all  this  trouble  —  and  how  much  she  has 
admired  you,  too?  ..." 

Cally's  eyes  wavered  and  fell.  And  suddenly  she  divined  that 
this,  and  nothing  else,  was  what  Mrs.  Page  had  come  to  say. 

"All  of  us  make  mistakes  in  this  world,"  went  on  the  kind 
voice  —  "all  that  I  know  do  wrong.  But  not  all  of  us,  I'm 
afraid,  have  the  courage  to  go  back  and  set  right  what  we  did, 
as  bravely  as  you  have  done." 

The  girl  stood  dumb.  .  .  .  Strange,  indeed,  that  the  first  word 
of  understanding  sympathy  she  had  had  since  her  home-coming 
— barring  only  Hen  Cooney — should  have  come  from  this  worse 
than  stranger,  whom  at  a  distance  she  had  long  secretly  envied 
and  disliked.  One  touch  of  generous  kindness,  and  the  hostility 
of  years  seemed  to  fall  away.  .  .  . 

She  raised  her  eyes,  trying  with  indifferent  success  to  smile. 

332 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

But  perhaps  her  look  showed  something  of  what  she  felt:  for  Mrs. 
Page  immediately  took  the  girl's  face  between  her  hands  and 
kissed  her  lightly  on  the  cheek. 

"May  !?...!  mean  by  it  that  I  hope  you  '11  let  me  know 
you  better,  when  I'm  home  again.  .  .  .  Good-bye." 

Cally  caught  the  gloved  hand  upon  her  cheek,  and  said,  with 
an  impulsiveness  far  from  her  habit: 

"I  think  you're  the  sweetest  person  I  ever  saw.  .  .  ." 

And  two  days  later,  she  said  to  her  mother,  though  in  a  dis 
tinctly  frivolous  tone: 

"What  would  you  think  of  me  as  a  Settlement  worker, 
mamma?" 

"Settlement  worker?  .  .  .  Well,  we'll  see,"  said  Mrs.  Heth, 
absently.  "It  remains  to  be  seen  how  far  the  best  people  are 
^bing  in  for  it.  .  .  ." 

Cally  laughed.  She  was  beautifully  dressed,  and  felt  per 
fectly  poised.  It  was  five  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  and  she  and 
her  mother  were  in  the  new  vindication  limousine,  en  route  to 
the  old  Dabney  House. 

"What  difference  does  that  make?" 

"All  the  difference.  .  .  .  Now,  Cally,  don't  pick  up  any  of 
poor  Henrietta's  equality  notions,  just  because  you  feel  a  little 
blue  at  present.  This  is  going  to  come  out  all  right.  You  may 
trust  me." 

"I  do,"  said  Cally,  sincerely. 

After  a  silence  she  added  with  a  laugh:  "Who  are  the  best 
people,  mamma?" 

"I  am,  for  one,"  said  mamma;  and  unconsciously  her  grasp 
tightened  on  the  little  ornamental  bag  where  snuggled  her  Set 
tlement  check  for  Ten  Thousand  Dollars,  securely  bagged  at  last. 

"  Don't  let  any  poor  nobodies  pull  you  down  to  their  level  with 
their  talk  about  merit,"  said  mamma.  "What's  merit  in 
society?" 


XXIV 

How  the  Best  People  came  to  the  Old  Hotel  again;  how  Colly  is 
Ornamental,  maybe,  but  hardly  a  Useful  Person;  how  she  en 
counters  Three  Surprises  from  Three  Various  Men,'  all  dis 
agreeable  but  the  Last. 

TO  the  Dabney  House,  it  was  like  old  times  come  back. 
Not  in  forty  years  had  the  ancient  hostelry  so  resounded 
with  the  steps  of  the  best  people.  Without,  there  stood 
lines  of  motor-cars  in  -the  shabby  and  unaccustomed  street,  ten 
times  as  many  as  there  had  been  in  May.  Within  —  to  prove 
at  a  stroke  the  tone  of  the  gathering  —  J.  Forsythe  Avery  himself 
stood  conspicuously  at  the  very  door:  not  merely  stood,  but 
labored  behind  a  deal  table  for  the  cause,  distributing  Settlement 
pamphlets,  brochures  or  treatises,  to  all  comers.  He  irresistibly 
reminded  Carlisle  of  one  of  those  lordly  men  in  gold-lace  outside 
a  painless  dentist's  parlors.  Many  others  of  the  conquering 
order  there  were  observed  also,  almost  in  the  first  glance;  chiefly 
congregating  in  the  new  assembly  room,  where  the  "opening 
reception"  was  under  way,  but  also  deploying  in  numbers  all 
over  the  lower  floor  and  the  remodeled  basement  beneath. 

It  was  the  Heths'  first  public  appearance  since  their  home 
coming,  and  perhaps  even  mamma  felt  a  little  bit  self-conscious. 
But  Carlisle  had  come  with  serious  intentions,  and  a  manner  of 
determined  vivacity.  Let  people  find  anything  to  gloat  over  in 
her  appearance,  if  they  could.  Glancing  about  as  they  left  Mr. 
Avery,  she  saw  that  the  old  court  or  lobby,  where  she  had  stood 
and  talked  once  on  a  rainy  May  day,  had  been  left  intact,  only 
renovated  somewhat  as  to  floor  and  walls.  On  one  side  of  it  now 
ran  down  a  row  of  offices  with  new  glass  doors,  the  first  of  them 
marked  "  Mr.  Pond."  On  the  other  side,  a  great  arched  doorway 
led  into  the  large  meeting-room,  formed  by  the  demolition  of 

334 


V.    V. 's     Eyes- 

many  partitions.   Changed  indeed  it  all  was:  yet  Cally  found  it 
quite  disturbingly  familiar  too.  .  .  .' 

Beyond  the  arched  doorway  stood  a  little  group  of  the  best 
men  and  women:  a  reception  committee  clearly,  and  Mrs.  Heth 
had  not  been  asked  to  serve  upon  it,  as  she  was  instantly  and  in 
dignantly  conscious.  However,  she  was  one  to  bear  martyrdom 
nobly,  knowing  that  truth  would  prevail  in  the  end;  and  accord 
ingly  she  greeted  Byrds,  Daynes,  and  others  with  marked  and 
lingering  cordiality.  Carlisle,  passing  down  the  receiving  line 
more  quickly,  soon  found  herself  introduced  to  Pond,  the  im 
ported  Director,  according  to  her  plan.  The  phrase  is  accurate, 
for  Mr.  Pond  appeared  to  be  panjandrum  here,  and  people  of  all 
degree  were  presented  to  him,  as  to  royalty.  Frequent  hearing  of 
the  man's  name  in  the  last  few  days  had  suggested  nothing  to 
Carlisle,  but  the  moment  she  caught  sight  of  his  keen  face  with 
the  powerful  blue-tinged  jaw,  she  recalled  that  she  had  seen  Mr. 
Pond  in  the  Dabney  House  before  now. 

The  Director  had  turned  with  business-like  indifference  as 
Mr.  Dayne  spoke  her  name,  but  his  expression  as  he  looked  at  her 
took  on  a  sudden  half-surprised  intentness  which  Carlisle  had 
seen  upon  the  faces  of  strangers  before  now.  His  reply  to  her 
commonplaces  of  greeting  was: 

"Where  have  I  met  you  before?" 

"Nowhere,  I  think." 

Bored  with  the  tenor  of  his  speech,  she  looked  at  him  steadily 
yet  negligently  for  a  moment;  and  then,  releasing  her  gaze, 
continued:  "This  is  the  assembly  room,  is  n't  it?  What  sort  of 
meetings  are  to  be  held  here?" 

A  faintly  quizzical  look  came  into  the  man's  incisive  stare. 

"  Do  you  really  think  it  worth  while  for  me  to  explain,  when  — " 

He  left  this  beginning  hanging  in  midair,  while  he  turned,  with 
out  apology,  to  accept  the  humble  duties  of  three  new  arrivals. 
Cally  waited  patiently.  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page  had  left  her  possessed 
of  an  impulse,  which  she  took  to  be  almost  tantamount  to  a  reso 
lution.  She  would  give  at  least  part  of  her  time  to  doing  some 
thing  solid.  .  .  . 

Director  Pond,  turning  back  to  her,  concluded: 

335 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"When  we  are  both  well  aware  that  you  don't  care  a  con 
tinental  what  sort  of  meetings  are  going  to  be  held  here?" 

"Oh,  but  I  do,  you  see,"  replied  Cally,  distinctly  irritated. 
"I'm  very  much  interested.  One  of  the  reasons  I'm  here  this 
afternoon,"  she  explained,  not  without  an  under-feeling  of  sad 
nobility,  "is  that  I  am  thinking  of  offering  myself  as  —  as  a 
worker." 

"Oh!  — As  a  worker." 

"Yes." 

"A  worker.  You  mean  it?" 

She  said,  glancing  indifferently  away:  "But  probably  Mr. 
Dayne  is  the  person  I  should  speak  to  about  it.  ...  Or  —  per 
haps  Dr.  Vivian.  .  .  ." 

"What's  Dayne  or  Vivian  got  to  do  with  it?  Walk  a  little 
away  from  the  door  with  me  —  there  1  Thank  the  Lord  when  this 
mob  clears  out.  ...  So  you  want  to  offer  as  a  worker,"  said 
Director  Pond,  his  face  gravely  authoritative.  "Good.  We  need 
workers  more  than  money  now,  which  is  putting  it  somewhat 
strongly.  I  am  pleased  that  you  will  join  us.  When  can  you 
move  in?" 

"Move  in?" 

"You  understand,  of  course,  that  resident  workers  are  the 
only  ones  good  for  anything.  You  will  want  to  live  here,  for  a 
year  or  so  at  least.  Naturally  the  sooner  you  can  come  the 
better." 

"Live  here?  Here  in  the  Dabney  House?  Well,  no,"  said 
Carlisle,  with  open  amusement,  "I  could  hardly  do  that." 

"Ah?"  said  he,  without  the  slightest  change  of  expression. 
"  Well,  that 's  a  pity.  .  .  .  Allow  me  to  raise  my  hand  and  point  at 
this  wall,  so;  and  now  people  will  understand  that  I  'm  explaining 
important  points  to  a  worker,  and  will  not  interrupt.  Of  course 
there  is  something  for  the  non-residents  to  do,  too.  Let  us  see 
now.  You  can  sew,  I  suppose?  " 

"Sew?  .  .  .  Well  —  not  really  well  at  all." 

"Too  bad,"  said  he,  keeping  his  broad  back  to  the  lively 
groups  about  them  and  pointing  steadily  at  the  wall.  "However 
—  I'm  thinking  of  putting  in  a  woman's  infirmary.  Can  you 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


recommend  yourself  as  reasonably  fitted  for  an  assistant  amateur 
nurse?" 

"Oh,  no!  No,  I  could  n't  do  that,  I'm  afraid.  I  can't  bear 
sickness." 

"Indeed?  A  great  many  people  enjoy  it.  .  .  .  Well!  —  district 
visitor  it  is,  then,  while  we're  getting  acquainted  with  the  neigh 
borhood.  But  it  means  business,  you  know  —  six  days  a  week 
visiting  in  the  homes  of  the  poorest,  dirtiest  and  meanest,  inves 
tigating,  collecting  facts  under  instructions  you  will  get  from 
me—" 

"Oh!  Well,  no  — not  that.  I  — I'm  afraid  my  mother 
would  n't  care  to  have  me  do  that." 

The  man's  pointing  hand,  which  was  large  and  strong-looking, 
fell  at  his  side,  and  he  gazed  at  her  with  a  sarcasm  which  he  no 
longer  troubled  to  conceal. 

"May  I  ask  what  under  the  sun  you  can  do?" 

"What  I  can  do?  .  .  ." 

Under  his  hard  and  frankly  belittling  stare,  Carlisle  began  to 
feel  rather  small,  despite  her  firm  resolves  to  feel  nothing  of  the 
sort.  She  had  heard  something  of  this  Mr.  Pond  in  the  past  week : 
a  person  of  some  consequence  in  the  world,  it  was  said,  several 
kinds  of  Doctor,  and  the  author  of  a  work  on  The  Settlement 
which  was  considered  "standard"  and  which  Cally  had  meant 
(since  last  night)  to  purchase  at  Saltman's  bookstore.  Report 
made  him  also  a  man  of  some  independent  means  and  position, 
and  certainly  he  had  come  with  excellent  letters  and  credentials. 
But  Cally  did  not  consider  that  these  things  justified  anybody  in 
being  so  thoroughly  hateful,  particularly  when  you  could  see  that 
it  was  only  an  eccentric  pose.  .  .  . 

"That,"  said  she,  with  dignity,  "is  what  I  am  now  consider 
ing-" 

"But  you  Ve  already  offered  to  help !  I  merely  request  you,  in  a 
polite  manner,  to  state  how  you  can  help  me,  in  my  big,  serious 
and  important  work.  .  .  .  Does  n't  it  occur  to  you,  in  fact,  that 
you  are  somewhat  helpless?  " 

"Does  it  occur  to  you  that  you  are  being  somewhat 
rude?" 

337 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Does  it  occur  to  you  that  what  you  call  rudeness  may  be 
exactly  the  sort  of  wholesome  irritant  needed  by  people  of  your 
class?" 

"What  do  you  mean  by  people  of  my  class?" 

Cally  raised  a  white-gloved  hand  and  put  back  a  tendril  of  her 
gay  hair.  She  looked  at  him  level-eyed.  The  man's  constant  and 
cocksure  "I,"  "me,"  "mine,"  rubbed  her  strongly  the  wrong 
way.  This  was  Dr.  Vivian's  Settlement,  and  nobody  else's.  She 
was  convinced  that  Vivian  would  have  made  a  far  better  Di 
rector  anyway.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Pond,  however,  smiled  suddenly.  The  smile  largely  trans 
formed  his  dark  face,  making  it  look  for  the  first  time  quite  agree 
able,  and  even  kind. 

"I  mean,"  said  he,  "those  who  are  highly  ornamental,  but  can 
not  candidly  be  described  as  generally  useful." 

The  reply,  for  some  reason,  silenced  her.  She  thought  of  Mrs. 
Page.  The  man's  smile  faded. 

"Not,"  said  he,  "that  I  don't  consider  ornaments  of  use.  I 
do,  in  their  place.  Now  I  must  get  back  to  the  firing-line.  I  can 
only  add  that  if  you  are  serious  about  wanting  to  help  me,  Miss 
—  I'm  afraid  I  did  n't  catch  your  name  —  you  will  lose  no  time 
in  qualifying  yourself  to  be  of  service.  Obviously  you  are  not 
so  qualified  at  present." 

He  nodded  curtly,  and  turned  away.  The  admiring  populace 
swallowed  him  up.  .  .  . 

Cally  felt  as  if  she  had  received  a  severe  drubbing.  She  felt 
rebuffed,  defeated,  depressed,  and  at  the  same  time  vaguely  stim 
ulated.  However,  the  moment  for  introspective  analysis  was  not 
now.  ... 

"Well,  Cally,"  said  motherly  Mrs.  McVey,  drifting  by,  "you 
must  feel  sort  of  lonesome  —  such  a  turn-out  of  old  folks  I  never 
saw.  I  wanted  Evey  to  come,  but  she  said  she  'd  as  soon  go  to  a 
tea  at  the  Needy  Ladies'  Home." 

On  the  heels  of  Evey's  mother  came  Cally's  own,  whose  watch 
ful  eye  had  been  felt  from  a  distance  before  now.  Possibly 
mamma  had  not  forgotten  what  happened  the  last  time  Cally 
came  to  the  Dabney  House.  .  .  . 

338 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"I  saw  you  talking  with  Mr.  Pond,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  a  little 
aside.  "How  did  he  impress  you?" 

"  He 's  the  most  conceited  human  being  I  ever  saw,"  said  Cally. 
"I  believe  he  said  one  or  two  fairly  interesting  things." 

"Well  —  that's  not  a  bad  recommendation.  I  like  an  import 
ant  man  to  think  well  of  himself.  I  '11  ask  him  for  my  Settlement 
dinner  Saturday,  when  those  Cheritons  stop  nagging  at  him." 

Mamma  looked  slightly  flushed  beneath  her  fixed  smile;  a  look 
which  her  daughter  had  no  difficulty  in  understanding.  More 
than  once  this  afternoon,  Cally  had  encountered  significant 
stares  upon  herself,  instantly  removed,  which  showed  with  amus 
ing  candour  that  she  was  the  subject  of  conversation  in  those 
quarters.  No  more  could  she  assume  that  this  conversation  and 
those  stares  were  but  the  involuntary  offerings  of  the  multitude 
to  beauty  and  brilliant  success.  And  yet  she  did  not  seem  to  mind 
so  very  much.  .  .  . 

"I  just  gave  my  Settlement  check  to  Mr.  Byrd,"  added 
mamma.  "He  was  very  grateful,  but  not  as  grateful  as  he  ought 
to  have  been." 

She  glided  back  to  her  position  near  the  door.  Mrs.  McVey, 
chatting  on,  observed  that  the  Pond  man  had  n't  seemed  impa 
tient  to  make  her  acquaintance,  though  she  had  waited  round 
some  time  to  give  him  the  pleasure;  also  that  there  were  no  re 
freshments  but  ice-water  from  the  new  ten-gallon  cooler  in  the 
hall.  Then  she,  in  her  turn,  passed  on,  as  J.  Forsythe  Avery  was 
discerned  steering  in  a  fixed  direction  through  the  crowd. 

"Are  your  labors  ended  so  soon?" 

Mr.  Avery  bowed  pluperfectly,  and  Cally  smiled  suddenly.  He 
was  a  pink,  slightly  bald  young  man,  and  had  once  been  de 
scribed  by  Mr.  Berkeley  Page  as  very  gentlemanly. 

"What  are  you  laughing  at?"  inquired  he,  somewhat  lugubri 
ously. 

"Only  at  something  funny  Mrs.  McVey  just  said.  You  know 
how  witty  she  is.  ...  Have  you  handed  them  all  out?" 

"I  appointed  a  deputy,"  confessed  Mr.  Avery,  "but  I  labored 
hard  for  a  time.  Am  I  not  entitled  to  —  er  —  the  rewards  of 
labor  now?" 

339 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


Cally  glanced  away,  with  no  more  desire  to  smile.  The  look  in 
his  pink  eyes  had  arrested  her  attention,  and  she  wondered 
whether  she  could  possibly  bring  herself  to  take  him.  She  was  not 
wanted  as  a  Settlement  worker;  and  he  would  be  colossally 
wealthy  some  day.  Perhaps  he  lacked  an  indefinable  something 
that  comes  from  grandfathers,  but  he  had  never  committed  a 
social  fault  in  his  life,  unless  you  would  hold  up  against  him  an 
incurable  fondness  for  just  one  tiny  little  drop  of  cologne  on  a 
pure  linen  handkerchief.  Mamma  would  be  rather  pleased,  poor 
dear. 

Then  her  mind's  eye  gave  her  a  flashing  memory-picture  of  Can 
ning,  the  matchless,  and  Mr.  Avery  became  unimaginable.  .  .  . 

"Such  as  what?"  said  she,  listlessly,  to  his  roguish  hints  of 
reward. 

"I  should  offer  my  escortage  for  —  er  —  a  small  tour  over  the 
premises,  and  so  forth.  Why  not?" 

"No  reason  in  the  world,  except  that  I  may  not  go  over  the 
prem  ..." 

That  word  the  speaker  left  forever  unfinished.  And  her  next 
remark  was: 

"What  did  you  say?" 

Obviously  there  was  an  interlude  here ;  and  in  it  Cally  Heth  had 
seen,  and  recovered  from  the  sudden  sight  of,  the  strange  young 
man  Mr.  V.  V.,  upon  whom  her  eyes  had  not  fallen  since  a  sunny 
May  morning  when  she  had  sat  and  wept  before  him.  He  stood 
quite  near,  the  founder  of  the  Settlement,  though  in  an  obscure 
corner:  backed  there,  it  seemed,  by  a  fat  conversationalist  in  a 
purple  bonnet.  But  there  must  have  been  telepathy  in  Cally's 
gaze  for  her  one  confidant;  for  she  had  no  sooner  descried  his  tall 
figure  through  the  fuss  and  feathers  than  he  turned  his  eyes  and 
looked  at  her. 

She  had  considered  with  mingled  feelings  the  prospect  of  meet 
ing  this  man  again  to-day;  and  now  the  sight  of  his  face  and  lucid 
gaze  brought  something  of  that  sense  of  shock  which  had  at 
tended  these  encounters  in  other  days.  Only  now,  twined  with 
the  painfulness  of  many  associations  which  his  look  aroused, 
there  was  a  sort  of  welcome,  odd  and  unexpected ;  she  felt  a  little 

340 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

start  of  gladness,  as  at  the  unlooked-for  appearance  of  some 
thing  trusted  and  familiar.  How  was  it  that  she  had  thought 
so  little  of  him  in  these  months,  through  which  it  had  seemed 
that  there  was  nobody  who  understood?  .  .  . 

She  bowed,  in  quite  a  bright  and  friendly  way,  putting  down 
her  inward  disquiet ;  and  then  it  was  that,  turning  hastily  again 
to  the  faithful  Avery,  Cally  inquired: 

"What  did  you  say?" 

"I  suggested,"  said  the  pink  and  pluperfect  one,  "that  you 
ought  to  see  the  gymnasium  and  swimming-pool  at  any  rate.  I  'rn 
informed  that  the  pool  is  the  largest  in  the  State,  and  .  .  ." 

But  Cally  had  seen  that  the  man  from  another  world  was  step 
ping  out  from  his  obscurity;  and  now  there  sounded  above 
the  Avery  periods  the  vivid  voice  first  heard  in  the  summer- 
house. 

"Miss  Heth!  —  may  I  say  how-do-you-do?  ...  I  hadn't 
seen  you  till  that  moment.  In  fact,  I  had  no  idea  you  were 
here  .  .  ." 

"Oh,  yes,  indeed.  I'm  a  Life  Member,  if  you  please,"  said 
Cally  turning,  looking  again  at  the  owner  of  that  voice.  "How 
do  you  do?  Do  you  know  Mr.  Avery,  Dr.  Vivian?" 

The  two  men  bowed.  Young  Mr.  V.  V.  had  not  long  retained 
the  slim  hand  which  —  such  was  his  lot  —  had  been  offered  to 
him  for  the  first  time  in  his  life. 

"Oh,  Miss  Kemper!"  added  Cally.  "Do  forgive  me  —  I  did  n't 
recognize  your  back  at  all.  May  I  introduce  Mr.  Avery?  ..." 

And  then,  while  Mr.  Avery  paid  reluctant  devoirs  to  the  lady 
in  the  purple  bonnet,  Cally  said  quite  easily  to  Dr.  Vivian: 

"I  was  just  debating  whether  or  not  to  make  an  exploring 
expedition  over  the  whole  Settlement.  Is  there  much  to  see?  — 
or  is  it  mostly  rooms?" 

"Oh,  mostly  rooms,"  said  Mr.  V.  V. 

He  seemed  to  begin  a  smile  at  this  point,  and  then  to  change 
his  mind  about  it.  The  smile,  if  such  it  was,  ended  short,  as  if 
clipped  off. 

"This  door,"  he  added  turning  to  the  fresh-painted  portal  at 
his  elbow,  "leads  to  one  of  them.  ...  A  fair  sample,  I  imagine. 


V.    V.  Js      Eyes 

This  one  happens  to  be  a  —  ah  —  a  sort  of  sewing-class  room,  I 
believe " 

"Ol\,  a  sewing-class  room!  That  must  be  where  I  was  offered 
a  position." 

"Will  you  look  at  it?" 

"I'd  like  to.  Only  I  can't  sew  a  bit,  you  see " 

She  stepped  exploringly  through  the  open  door,  into  the  sort  of 
sewing-class  room.  V.  Vivian  walked  after  her;  and  behind  him 
he  distinctly  heard  the  surprised  and  somewhat  offended  voice  of 
the  Kemper: 

" Funny!  I  thought  that  was  Mr.  Pond  I  was  talking  to  all  the 
time." 

"It's  —  it's  a  very  nice  place,"  said  Cally,  glancing  about  her 
as  she  advanced. 

Not  that  it  mattered,  but  it  really  was  not  a  particularly  nice 
place,  only  a  rather  dark  and  small  chamber,  smelling  of  paint 
and  entirely  empty  save  for  one  bench. 

"Not  a  great  deal  to  see,  as  you  notice,"  said  the  summer- 
house  voice  behind  her,  sounding  somehow  changed  since  last 
year.  .  .  .  /'Not  much  of  a  class  could  sit  on  the  bench,  I  fear. 
Or  perhaps  it's  this  next  room  that's  for  sewing." 

"Oh,  I  don't  mind,"  said  Cally. 

And  then  she  turned  suddenly  upon  Mr.  V.  V.,  facing  him,  look 
ing  up  with  a  sweet,  half -wistful  smile  such  as  her  face  had  never 
worn  before  for  him. 

"But  tell  me  something  about  yourself  .  .  .  What  sort  of  sum 
mer  have  you  had?" 

So  he  was  brought  to  a  halt,  confronting  in  one  of  his  donated 
rooms  the  loveliest  of  the  Huns;  confronting,  but  not  looking  at 
her  exactly.  .  .  . 

"Well,  it 's  been  hot,  as  you  know  —  in  fact,  the  hottest  sum 
mer  since  the  Weather  Bureau  began.  That  was  n't  comfortable, 
of  course.  There  was  a  good  deal  of  suffering,  where  people 
could  n't  afford  ice.  .  .  .  Personally,  I ' ve  happened  to  be  so  busy 
that  the  weather  did  n't  matter  — " 

"  That's  quite  ominous,  is  n't  it,  in  a  doctor?  Has  there  been  so 
much  sickness  in  this  neighborhood?" 

342 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

"Yes,  there's  been  a  lot  of  it.  We  had  rather  a  bad  typhoid 
epidemic,  beginning  in  July  —  not  easy  to  check  in  this  old  dis 
trict,  standing  pretty  much  as  it  was  before  the  war.  I  some 
times  think  there 's  no  hope  of  ever  cleaning  it  out,  short  of  a  Lon 
don  fire.  ...  I  —  I  hope  you've  been  well?" 

"Oh,  yes,  quite  well,  thank  you.  But  is  this  district  so  bad — 
from  a  health  point  of  view?" 

"You  should  see  it,"  said  he,  rather  drily.  "Or  rather,  of 
course,  you  should  n't.  It 's  more  or  less  disturbing  to  one's  peace 
of  mind  at  times.  ..." 

She  was  looking  at  him  with  an  interested  intentness  of  which 
she  was  quite  unconscious.  Never  before  had  she  seen  this  man 
free  of  the  knowledge  of  menacing  discussion  ever  pressing  in  the 
foreground;  so  now  it  was  a  little  as  if  she  met  for  the  first  time 
some  one  whom  she  had  heard  a  great  deal  about  from  others. 
Her  eye  for  externals  had  observed  his  new  suit  at  once;  in  this 
deceptive  light  she  considered  that  it  looked  quite  nice,  not  sus 
pecting  that  it  was  only  the  Prince,  reduced;  and  she  was  think 
ing,  with  a  sense  of  discovery,  that  Mr.  V.  V.  was  undoubt 
edly  a  good-looking  man.  A  certain  change  in  his  manner  she 
had  also  noted;  a  new  touch  of  force,  it  seemed,  a  somewhat 
stiffened  masculinity.  What  had  become  of  that  rather  engaging 
hopeful  look  of  his,  which  was  the  second  thing  she  had  ever 
noticed  about  him?  .  .  . 

"Perhaps  I  shall  see  it  some  dayz"  she  answered.  "If  I  ever 
become  one  of  your  Mr.  Pond's  district  visitors  and  investiga 
tors." 

"Are  you  thinking  of  doing  that?" 

"Oh,  I  offered  to  try  to  do  something,  but  Mr.  Pond  declined 
me,  without  thanks.  He  said  I  was  perfectly  useless  to  him  —  in 
his  big  and  serious  work.  The  worst  of  it  was,"  she  said,  smiling 
rather  ruefully,  "he  proved  it." 

She  was  glancing  toward  the  door,  with  the  moving  and  hum 
ming  groups  beyond,  and  so  missed  the  sudden  eagerness  that 
briefly  lit  his  face. 

"What  part  of  the  work  —  if  I  might  ask  —  were  you  —  spe 
cially  interested  in?" 

343 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"I  suppose  I'm  not  really  interested  in  any  part.  That  must 
be  the  trouble.  Probably  it 's  just  the  usual  dissatisfied  feeling  — 
when  one  is  a  little  tired  of  parties.  ..."  «  ' 

Was  that  not  yet  another  confidence,  clearly  calling  for  an  un 
derstanding  listener,  for  sympathetic  reassurance?  Nothing  of 
the  sort  came  to  Cally;  nothing  of  any  sort.  The  brief  pause, 
sharpened  as  it  was  by  Mr.  V.  V.'s  oddly  formal  bearing,  was 
rather  like  a  cold  douche.  And  now  it  seemed  that  she  must 
have  been  counting  on  this  man  somehow  all  along,  though  it  was 
not  clear  as  to  what.  .  .  . 

"  So  you  see  my  peace  of  mind  is  quite  safe.  Mr.  Pond  is  right, 
of  course.  .  .  ."  And  then,  thinking  that  this  cool  distance  was 
rather  absurd  under  the  circumstances,  she  added  in  a  friendlier 
way:  "But  why  aren't  you  the  Director  here,  instead  of  Mr. 
Pond?  I  should  think  you  would  be,  since  it's  your  Settlement." 

But  the  result  of  that  was  only  to  bring  new  stiffness  into  the 
strange  young  man's  manner. 

"My  Settlement!  .  .  .  Oh,  I  beg  that  you  won't  speak  or  think 
of  it  in  that  way.  I  assure  you  I  've  nothing  at  all  to  do  with  it, 
other  than  as  one  worker  out  of  many." 

Her  un warlike  reply  was:  "Well,  I  have  n't  told  anybody." 

She  glanced  at  him  with  a  touch  of  bewilderment,  and  glanced 
away  again,  turning  toward  the  door.  Surely  he  had  not  always 
been  like  this.  .  .  . 

"Mr.  Avery  will  think  I'm  lost,"  said  Cally. 

However,  Mr.  V.  V.  successfully  checked  her  departure,  say 
ing: 

"I'm  sure  you  can  be  of  the  realest  help  to  the  Settlement, 
Miss  Heth,  if  you  care  to  be."  And,  then,  veering  abruptly,  he 
said  with  his  air  of  making  a  plunge:  "But  I  must  take  this 
opportunity  to  speak  to  you  of  another  matter.  A  matter  which, 
I  fear,  will  be  disagreeable  to  you." 

That  sufficiently  arrested  her;  she  stood  looking  at  him,  with  a 
conflict  of  sensations  within.  Faces  of  Settlementers  appeared  in 
the  door,  looked  in  at  the  bare  room,  passed  from  view  again. 
The  tall  young  man  in  the  new  suit  pushed  back  his  hair,  with  the 
quaint  gesture  he  had. 

344 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"You  once  said,"  he  continued,  in  a  voice  of  light  hardness, 
"that  I  brought  you  nothing  but  trouble.  That  seems  to  con 
tinue  true,  though  perhaps  you  won't  regard  this  as  so  —  so 
serious.  .  .  ." 

Trouble?  More  trouble  for  Cally  Heth? 

"Why  —  what  do  you  mean?" 

"The  question  of  the  Heth  Works  —  has  come  up  again.  That, 
at  least,  is  the  particular  application.  Of  course  many  other  fac 
tories  are  involved." 

The  girl  was  completely  taken  aback.  "Why,  I  don't  under 
stand.  What  has  come  up?" 

He  then  explained  himself,  in  well-ordered  sentences: 

"The  State  Labor  Commission  feels  strongly  that  the  public 
good  demands  a  new  factory  law  at  this  time,  requiring  all  owners 
to  conform  to  a  certain  higher  standard  of  comfort  and  safety 
for  their  employees.  I  must  add  that  I  fully  share  the  Commis 
sion's  feeling.  It  is  considered  that  some  publicity  in  the  press  is 
needed,  preparing  the  public  mind  for  a  progressive  law  by  show 
ing  what  present  conditions  are.  A  series  of  articles  has  been  de 
cided  upon,  to  begin  about  the  first  of  November  and  continue 
daily  till  the  legislature  meets  in  January.  I  have  agreed  to  write 
these  articles.  I  thought  it  only  fair,"  he  ended  short,  "to  tell 
you  this." 

The  girl  heard  him  with  startled  astonishment.  She  had  never, 
of  course,  been  interested  in  her  father's  factory  other  than 
as  a  family  symbol;  and  that  factitious  interest  which  she  had 
felt  at  times  last  year,  born  of  this  man's  hostility,  was  gone  long 
since,  effaced  by  a  tide  of  stronger  feelings.  So  his  sudden  exhuma 
tion  of  the  topic  as  a  cause  of  war  now  came  upon  her  with  the 
harshest  discordance.  It  seemed  almost  like  a  wanton  wounding 
of  her,  somehow  like  sheer  disloyalty  in  him.  Surely  if  there  were 
need  of  articles,  this  man  might  leave  them  to  somebody  else  to 
write.  .  .  . 

Her  young  gaze  was  full  of  an  unconscious  reproachfulness. 

"All  that  means  that  you  are  going  to  put  some  more  letters  in 
the  paper  attacking  my  father?" 

"I'm  afraid  it's  inevitable  it  will  seem  so  to  you." 

345 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Oh,"'  said  she,  it  seemed  involuntarily,  "I  don't  see  how  you 
caul" 

The  young  man  Mr.  V.  V.  made  no  reply.  It  may  be  that  he 
did  n't  see  how  he  could  either.  .  .  . 

He  looked  away  from  the  reproachful  eyes,  slate-blue  to  match 
the  plumes  in  the  hat:  and  there  were  phrases  from  his  articles 
singing  and  kicking  in  his  head,  phrases  which  would  cry  in  the 
penny  newspaper  as  no  voice  could  cry  from  the  wilderness.  Ten 
thousand  words  he  had  ready  now,  in  the  old  secretary  upstairs; 
hard  words  all,  that  broke  heads  or  hearts,  faiths  implied  too,  it 
might  be,  and  did  not  care;  or  did  n't  mean  to  show  it  if  they  did. 
And  he  thought,  too,  of  a  little  friend  he  had,  just  pulled  back  from 
death's  door,  and  hardly  ready  for  her  Trip  now,  after  ten  weeks. 
So  of  course  there  could  be  no  flinching  now.  .  .  . 

Through  the  door  there  came  the  continuous  sounds  of  the 
nearness  of  the  multitude,  but  these  two  seemed  almost  as  alone 
in  his  old  hotel  as  they  had  been  on  another  afternoon  long  ago. 

"Don't  you  think,"  said  the  pretty  voice,  still  not  angry  —  and 
surely  anger  would  have  been  easier  to  meet  than  this  —  "that 
before  doing  anything  so  —  so  radical  as  that,  you  might  wait 
a  little  while,  believing  that  my  father  would  —  do  what  is 
right?" 

The  lame  doctor  brought  his  eyes  back  to  her  and  said,  slowly: 

"You  see,  I've  been  worried  by  the  feeling  —  that  I've  waited 
too  long  already." 

"Too  long  for  what?  That's  just  what  I  mean.  What  do  you 
think  could  possibly  happen?" 

"For  one  thing,  Miss  Heth,"  he  said,  with  a  faint  dry  smile, 
"  the  building  might  fall  down  some  day." 

Color  came  into  Cally's  cheek.  Her  feeling  now  was  that  she 
had  made  advances,  spontaneous  and  friendly,  and  been  smartly 
rebuffed.  What  cared  he  for  the  troubles  of  the  Heths?  .  .  . 

"You  really  think  my  father  would  risk  the  lives  of  his  em 
ployees,  just  to  make  a  little  more  money  for  himself?  " 

He  answered,  almost  brusquely:  "I  don't  mean  to  judge  your 
father.  People  take  their  views  of  life  from  the  atmosphere  in 
which  they  live.  You  appreciate  that.  I,  of  course,  concede  youi 

346 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

father's  point  of  view.  I  fully  understand  it.  I  —  wish  it  were 
possible  for  you  to  do  as  much  for  mine." 

She  looked  at  him  fixedly  a  moment,  said,  "I  'm  sorry  you  think 
this  necessary,"  and  turned  away  to  the  door.  But  once  again 
his  voice  arrested  her. 

"Miss  Heth!  .  .  .  You  feel  an  interest  in  the  Settlement. 
You  've  felt  a  wish  to  help  in  the  work  —  to  lend  a  hand  in  some 
way  to  those  less  fortunate  than  yourself.  You  —  you  haven 't 
as  yet  decided  just  what  you  want  to  do.  ... " 

She  had  paused  at  the  door,  half -turning;  their  eyes  met  once 
more.  And  now  the  whole  look  of  the  strange  young  man  seemed 
to  change,  and  he  said  with  sudden  gentleness: 

"Why  don't  you  go  to  the  Works  some  day?" 

But  it  was  late  in  the  day  to  seek  to  improve  matters  with  looks 
and  tones,  with  efforts  to  put  responsibilities  upon  her.  Cally 
answered  as  she  had  answered  him  once  before:  only  it  was  a 
mark  of  some  change  in  her  —  toward  him,  perhaps  toward 
life  itself  —  that  she  spoke  with  a  dignity  which  had  never  been 
hers  last  year. 

"I  don't  think  I  need  do  that  to  learn  that  my  father  is  n't  a 
homicide." 

For  the  second  time  also,  Cally  went  away  from  the  Dabney 
House  without  the  company  of  her  staunch  little  mother:  who 
would  remain  in  this  place  till  among  the  last,  contending  among 
the  best  people  for  the  thing  she  held  dearest  in  the  world. 

Cally,  however,  was  well  looked  after  by  Mr.  Avery,  who  wel 
comed  her  upon  the  threshold  of  the  sewing-class  room  (if  that  is 
what  it  was),  removing  himself  firmly  from  the  Kemper.  His  pro 
posal  was  to  continue  the  tour  of  the  premises,  but  she  replied 
that  she  found  Settlementing  dreadfully  boring,  and  was  of  a 
mind  to  steal  away  for  home.  The  disappointed  pink  one  then 
proposed  to  accompany  her,  and  pay  a  little  call,  as  he  put  it. 
However,  she  professed  an  incurable  dulness  after  her  slumming, 
and  countered  with  an  offer  to  set  him  down  at  his  club,  if  he 
liked. 

It  was  so  arranged,  with  the  gallant,  and  also  with  mamma. 

347 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

William  Banks,  detached  by  a  nod  from  the  procession  of  waiting 
vehicles  over  the  dingy  street,  wheeled  up  to  the  entrance;  halted 
with  a  whir;  electrically  self-started  himself  once  more.  Carlisle 
bowled  off  with  J.  Forsythe  Avery,  who  was  well  pleased  with 
this  token  of  her  regard,  and  resolved  to  make  the  most  of  it.  But 
soon  the  time  came  when  he  was  debarked  from  her  conveyance; 
she  was  rid  of  his  ponderous  ardors;  and  Cally  rolled  through 
the  twilight  streets  alone.  .  .  . 

There  had  settled  down  upon  her  a  deep  and  singular  depres 
sion.  Her  spirit  ached,  as  if  from  a  whipping.  She  thought  a 
little  of  the  Works;  she  had  remembered  that  moment  of  some 
what  painful  revelation  last  year;  but  no  reflection  brought  any 
doubt  of  her  father.  Long  since  she  had  reached  the  sound  con 
clusion  that  that  was  the  way  business  was;  and  if  this  fixed  belief 
had  been  shaken  a  little  now,  she  was  hardly  conscious  of  it.  Papa, 
of  course,  did  all  that  was  reasonable  and  right  for  his  work-peo 
ple;  it  was  perfectly  outrageous  that  he  should  be  subjected  to 
abuse  in  the  newspapers.  Dr.  Vivian,  for  his  part,  was  conceded 
a  religious  fellow's  strange  sense  of  duty,  though  it  required  an 
effort  to  concede  him  that.  Still  Cally  was  not  thinking  of  it  from 
these  points  of  view  exactly.  It  all  seemed  to  be  quite  personal, 
somehow.  .  .  . 

She  gazed  through  the  car-window  at  the  familiar  panorama, 
streets,  houses,  and  people  which  she  now  did  not  see.  It  had 
been,  indeed,  an  afternoon  of  snubs,  such  as  she  was  hardly  accus 
tomed  to  receiving;  and  she  seemed  to  have  lost  something  of 
that  wholesome  defensive  power  she  had  possessed  last  year, 
the  power  of  being  righteously  indignant.  Time's  whirligig  had 
brought  her  to  this,  —  that  she  had  all  but  offered  her  friendship 
to  Jack  Dalhousie's  friend,  and  he  had  more  than  repulsed  her. 
She  did  feel  indignant,  a  little;  but,  deeper  than  that,  she  felt 
wounded,  she  hardly  knew  why.  After  that  moment  of  barrier- 
less  intimacy  in  the  drawing-room,  how  could  he  bear  to  be  so 
hard? 

Her  vesper  thoughts  veered  a  little,  moved  from  Vivian  to 
Director  Pond,  who  had  also  brusquely  rebuffed  her.  It  was  Mrs. 
Page's  experience  that  Cally  had  had  this  afternoon,  and  she  too 

348 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

found  it  humiliating.  She  had  lately  caught  a  distant  glimpse 
of  "work"  in  terms  different  from  those  which  the  dull  word 
had  worn  heretofore:  vaguely  discerned  activities  in  which  the 
best  women  were  cooperating  usefully  with  men  —  cooperating 
equally  as  human  beings,  and  no  nonsense;  not  as  women  at  all. 
There  was  something  mysteriously  inviting  in  this.  She  had  felt 
a  bracing  absence  of  sex  in  Pond's  hectoring  catechism  and  blunt 
rejection  of  her.  Yes,  and  in  the  cool  declaration  of  war  from  Dr. 
Vivian,  who  had  grown  so  hard  since  May.  Busy  and  serious 
beings  these,  who  would  not  be  deterred  by  the  flutterings  of  the 
doubtless  ornamental  but  completely  useless.  .  .  . 
"You're  to  go  back  for  Mrs.  Heth,  William." 
"  Yas  'm,"  said  William,  and  clicked  the  little  door  behind  her. 
Yes,  and  where  there  was  no  sex,  there  she,  Cally  Heth,  was  n't 
wanted.  Hard  words  these,  but  they  seemed  to  have  the  ring  of 
truth.  She  was  wanted  as  a  woman,  she  was  wanted  as  an  orna 
ment,  but  she  appeared  to  have  no  particular  purpose  as  a  human 
being.  And  the  best  prospect  that  life  held  out  to  her  to-night  was 
to  settle  down  in  a  weary  world  as  Mrs.  J.  Forsythe  Avery. 

Cally  opened  the  front  door,  which  was  hospitably  kept  on  the 
latch  during  the  daytime,  and  stepped  into  the  dim  hall  of  home. 
Rarely  in  her  life  had  she  felt  more  dispirited.  Nevertheless,  when 
she  heard  a  footfall  from  the  direction  of  the  drawing-room,  and 
was  reminded  that  papa  had  already  come  in,  her  combative 
blood  plucked  up  at  once.  She  wanted  to  tell  her  father  immedi 
ately  that  he  was  going  to  be  attacked  in  the  papers;  never  fear 
but  he  would  know  what  to  do  about  it. 

"Papa!"  she  called.  "Where  are  you?  I  ..." 
Speaking,  she  had  put  her  head  through  the  drawing-room  por 
tieres,  rehung  that  very  day:  and  so  it  was^that  her  sentence  was 
never  ended  in  this  world.  For  it  was  not  papa  who  turned  so 
quickly  at  the  sound  of  her  voice,  and  came  walking  so  straight 
and  sure  towards  her.  Not  papa,  this  splendid  and  once  well- 
admired  figure,  now  confronting  her  with  such  unmistakable 
feeling.  No,  the  wonder  of  all  wonders  had  happened;  and  the 
universe  seemed  to  hang  in  momentary  suspense  as  Cally  Hetb 
looked  again  into  the  eyes  of  her  prince  of  lovers. 

349 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Carlisle,"  said  Hugo's  remembered  voice,  "I've  come  back." 

She  stood  unmoving  in  the  doorway,  her  fingers  tightening  on 
the  silken  hanging.  Her  breast  was  in  a  tumult  of  emotions,  in 
which  a  leaping  exultation  was  not  wanting.  But  stronger  than 
anything  else  in  this  moment  was  the  uprushing  feeling  that  here 
was  one  whom  she  had  well  trusted  once,  and  who  had  failed  her 
in  her  direst  need. 

"So  I  see,"  said  she. 

And  continuing  to  look  fixedly  at  him  as  he  advanced  upon  her, 
beginning  to  speak,  she  was  shot  through  with  a  bitter  thought: 

"He's  found  I'm  not  so  badly  damaged  after  all." 


XXV 

In  which  the  Name  of  Beth  is  lifted  beyond  the  Reach  of  Hateful 
Malice,  and  Mamma  wishes  that  she  had  the  Ten  Thousand  back 
again. 

MRS.  HETH  returned  from  the  Settlement  "opening"  a 
full  hour  behind  Carlisle,  and  in  a  victorious  glow  such  as 
she  had  not  known  since  May.  Doing  good  for  cause,  she 
was  not  one  to  blush  too  much  to  find  it  fame.  Having  notified 
Mr.  Byrd  of  her  ten  thousand  dollar  gift  to  the  Foundation  Fund, 
she  had  proceeded  with  her  tidings  to  others  of  the  authorities, 
and  presently  met  with  appreciation  in  proportion  to  the  funds 
involved.  Director  Pond,  a  decisive  and  forthright  man,  had 
stood  upon  a  chair  and  cried  the  splendid  donation  to  the  assem 
bled  company,  his  obvious  moral  being  that  others  similarly 
prospered  by  the  Lord  should  go  and  do  likewise.  So  had  come 
vindicatory  advertisement  gorgeous  beyond  the  little  lady's 
dreams. 

It  was  well  that  the  world  should  mark  this  gift,  for  it  had  not 
been  made  by  the  mere  scratching  of  a  signature.  And  the  collo 
quies  preceding  it  had  been  of  a  thoroughly  typical  sort,  compress 
ing  in-  a  nutshell  a  whole  history,  in  fact  the  whole  history,  of  the 
domestico-commercial  relationships  of  rising  Houses.  Settle- 
men  ters  might  have  applauded  more  heartily  had  they  understood 
just  what  a  deep-cutting  business  they  were  witnessing.  How 
ever,  they  did  not  understand  this,  and  Mrs.  Heth,  for  her  part, 
was  the  last  person  in  the  world  to  moralize  upon  the  non-essen 
tial.  Returning  homeward  through  the  night,  rolling  eclat  be 
neath  her  tongue,  she  frankly  reflected  that  it  was  worth  the 
money.  The  envious  would  hardly  be  able  to  conceive  that  peo 
ple  who  gave  so  magnificently  to  charity  could  have  done  any 
thing  really  deserving  of  censure;  no,  no.  Or,  if  such  people 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

imaginably  had,  then  certainly  the  only  thing  to  do  was  to  for 
get  all  about  it  as  quickly  as  possible.  .  .  . 

So  agreeably  musing,  Mrs.  Heth  arrived  at  the  door  of  the 
House,  and  received  upon  the  threshold  the  great  surprise  of  her 
life. 

It  was  almost  seven  o'clock,  so  long  had  she  lingered  to  enjoy 
and  capitalize  the  reverberations  of  her  triumph.  Yet  Carlisle, 
singularly  enough,  was  discovered  standing  in  the  hall,  still  in  her 
hat  and  gloves,  just  as  she  had  left  the  reception  an  hour  earlier. 

Full  as  Mrs.  Heth  was  of  her  own  engrossing  thoughts,  her 
daughter's  expression  at  once  notified  her  that  she,  too,  had  news 
of  some  sort  to  communicate. 

"Well,  Carlisle?  What 're  you ...  Why,  what's  happened?  " 

"You've  just  missed  Hugo,  mamma." 

"Hugo!"  said  mamma,  paling  and  almost  falling  backward. 
"He'sfoewhere?" 

In  her  daughter's  blue  eyes  there  lingered  that  gleaming  ex 
ultation,  not  completely  softened  as  yet  by  the  sweeter  and  now 
due  love-light. 

"He  wants  me  to  marry  him  next  month." 

"Oh,  Catty/  ..." 

Fairly  tumbling  forward  from  the  door,  Mrs.  Heth  gathered 
her  daughter  in  a  convulsive  bear-hug,  murmuring  ecstatic 
nothings.  Little  she  thought  of  Settlements  or  picayunish  dona 
tions  now. 

"Oh,  Cally!  .  .  .  Mamma's  so  happy  for  you,  dear  child!  .  .  . 
And  me  never  dreaming  he  was  within  a  thousand  miles!  All's 
well  that  ends  well,  /  say !  .  .  .  When  'd  he  come?  I  'm  wild 
to  see  him.  Where's  he  staying?  Will  he  be  back  this  even 
ing?" 

She  drew  away  from  her  unwonted  demonstration,  leaving  her 
hands  on  Cally's  shoulders,  and  the  two  women  looked  at  each 
other,  both  a  little  flushed  with  excitement. 

"He's  at  the  Arlington,  to  stay  only  till  to-morrow,"  said  she, 
"and  he's  coming  in  after  dinner  to  see  you  and  papa." 

"Oh!  ...  He  insists  on  not  seeing  you,  I  suppose?"  fleered 
mamma,  with  enormous  archness. 

352 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"I  won't  be  here,  you  see.  I'm  going  to  the  theatre  —  Mr. 
Avery's  getting  up  a  party." 

Mrs.  Heth  showed  as  much  surprise  as  the  jubilation  of  her 
countenance  could  accommodate. 

"Why,  my  dear  child!  Break  it,  of  course!  I'll  telephone  him 
myself  —  a  friend  from  out  of  town  — " 

"  But  I  don't  want  to  break  it,  you  see ! "  said  Carlisle,  laughing 
brightly.  "He  can't  expect  to  drop  in  after  months  and  months 
and  find  us  all  twirling  our  thumbs  on  the  doorstep,  you  know!" 

"But  you're  engaged  to  him  /" 

"I  should  hope  not!  .  .  .  Why,  mamma!  You  must  think 
I  'm  frightfully  —  die-away!  ...  I  'm  disciplining  him,  don't  you 
see  ?  I  'm  not  going  to  make  it  too  easy  for  him ! " 

"Oh!.  .  .  I  see!" 

Perhaps  she  did  not  see  exactly,  and  certainly  she  did  not  be 
lieve  in  manufacturing  sporting  chances  in  the  most  momentous 
matter  in  the  world.  But  then  neither  did  Cally,  she  well  knew; 
and  of  her  daughter's  victorious  skill  in  the  matter  of  managing 
men,  she  had  had  many  proofs,  and  now  this  crowning  one.  Lov 
ers'  coynesses  mattered  little  in  the  face  of  the  supreme  fact  of 
Canning's  return. 

"Well !  You  '11  give  him  the  whole  day  to-morrow,  of  course ! . . . 
And  don't  you  be  too  hard  on  the  dear  fellow,  Cally.  His  coming 
back  shows  he's  been  disciplined.  .  .  .  How  the  cats  will  open 
their  eyes!" 

"Probably.  .  .  .  But  don't  worry  about  Hugo,  mamma.  He'll 
do  just  what  I  say  after  this." 

Mamma  laughed  delightedly.  She  was  of  course  in  the  woman's 
league  for  the  general  putting  down  of  the  enemy,  Man.  The  two 
women  stood  staring  at  each  other  in  the  stately  hall. 

"  Next  month  /  "  said  mamma.  "  We  can't  do  it,  Cally !  Novem 
ber  would  be  better  —  much  better  —  just  before  Thanksgiving, 
don't  you  think?" 

Cally  laughed  merrily,  and  extricated  herself. 

"We'll  have  plenty  of  time  to  decide  about  that.  .  .  .  Now,  I 
must  fly  and  dress.  I  shan't  have  time  for  dinner,  mamma.  Will 
you  send  me  up  something  —  just  some  soup  and  coffee?" 

353 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Certainly,  darling,"  said  mamma. 

Already  there  had  crept  a  certain  absentness  into  the  campaign 
er's  voice.  Her  strong,  constructive  mind  was  slipping  away  from 
this  present,  measuring  over  the  triumphs  that  lay  ahead.  After 
her  darling  vanished  upstairs,  she  remained  standing  motionless 
by  the  newel-post,  in  her  fixed  eyes  the  gleam  of  a  brigadier- 
general  who  has  pulled  out  brilliant  victory  over  overwhelming 
obstacles.  The  god  in  the  machine  had,  indeed,  forever  put  the 
name  of  Heth  beyond  the  reach  of  hateful  malice.  .  .  . 

Suddenly  mamma  said  aloud,  rather  indignantly:  "I  wish  I  had 
that  ten  thousand  back! " 

In  her  own  room,  Cally  bathed,  dressed  at  some  speed,  and 
dined  lightly  between  whiles.  She  was  in  a  state  of  inner  exalta 
tion,  contrasting  oddly  with  her  depression  two  hours  earlier. 
Obliterated  now  was  her  conviction  of  her  own  human  uselessness 
in  a  world  of  sexes,  though  it  could  n't  be  said  that  anything  had 
happened  to  disprove  that  conviction,  exactly.  In  this  moment 
she  was  continuously  elated  by  all  that  was  signified  in  the  fact 
that  Hugo  Canning  was  to  spend  the  evening  downstairs  talking 
decorously  with  mamma  and  papa  while  she,  Cally,  loved  of  him, 
was  to  go  off  to  the  theatre  with  J.  Forsythe  Avery.  .  .  . 

If  Canning  had  failed  her  in  her  greatest  need,  time,  indeed, 
had  exquisitely  avenged  her.  The  Lord  of  the  righteous  had  de 
livered  the  prince  of  lovers  into  her  hand.  With  his  very  first 
words  in  the  dim  drawing-room,  Hugo  had  admitted,  for  the 
second  time  in  their  somewhat  stormy  courtship,  his  uncondi 
tional  surrender.  He  made  no  mistake  this  time  about  the  nature 
of  a  woman's  heart;  he  was  not  logical  or  controversial  or  just; 
but  advancing  straight  upon  her  over  her  decidedly  forbidding 
greeting,  he  had  spoken  out  with  evident  emotion: 

"Don't  look  at  me  that  way  —  I  can't  bear  it.  ...  Don't  you 
know  now  that  I  love  you?  I  love  you  so  that  I  won't  live  with 
out  you." 

Yes,  Cally  did  know  it  now.  She  had  clearly  wronged  both 
Hugo  and  herself  in  ever  thinking  of  him  as  a  male  flirt,  a  light- 
loving  jilt  who  too  easily  found  balm  for  a  heart  not  made  for 
deep  hurts.  Busy  and  gay  with  her  dressing,  Carlisle  thought  of 

354 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

the  Honorable  Kitty  Belden,  and  laughed  musically  to  her 
self. 

Yet  how  was  it  that,  under  so  manly  and  sweet  an  appeal 
straight  to  her  woman's  heart,  she  had  not  instantly  subsided  on 
the  shoulder  of  her  contrite  lover,  with  grateful  tears?  Cally  her 
self  hardly  understood.  She  was,  truth  to  tell,  secretly  surprised 
and  thrilled  by  her  own  high-handedness.  To  what  degree  she 
and  her  former  betrothed  had  remet  under  permanently  changed 
conditions,  it  was  beyond  her  thought  to  try  to  analyse  now.  Per 
haps  it  was  only  the  completeness  of  her  triumph  that  had  so 
fired  her  feminine  independence.  Had  she  met  Hugo  by  chance, 
and  found  him  lukewarm,  doubt  not  that  she  would  have 
striven  to  fan  the  embers.  .  .  . 

She  had  followed  her  intuitions,  which  never  reason,  and  when 
she  said  that  she  was  now  disciplining  her  prodigal,  she  spoke  out 
her  actual  feelings  as  far  as  she  herself  understood  them;  feelings, 
they  were,  which  had  a  deep  root  far  back  in  all  the  summer's 
unhappiness.  There  was  a  sentence  of  Hugo's  last  May:  "I  asked 
one  girl  to  be  my  wife;  have  you  the  right  to  offer  me  another  ?  "  She 
would  make  Hugo  pay  a  little  more  for  that  remark,  now  that  she 
could  just  as  easily  as  not. 

Like  Aaron's  rod,  the  return  of  Canning  had  swallowed  up  all 
other  facts  of  the  girl's  existence,  or  nearly  all.  She  was  lifted,  as 
on  wings,  out  of  the  slough  of  her  despond.  Nevertheless,  the 
news  heard  at  the  Settlement  recurred  even  now;  and  when  Mrs. 
Heth  appeared  in  the  bedroom,  just  after  eight,  Carlisle  greeted 
her  with: 

"Has  papa  gone  out,  mamma?" 

Mamma  said  no,  papa  was  in  the  study,  though  Mr.  Mac- 
Queen  was  with  him  just  at  the  moment.  Something  about  in 
stalling  some  new  machines  at  the  Works,  she  believed.  .  .  . 

"That  will  do,  Flora  —  Miss  Carlisle  has  everything  she 
needs.  .  .  . "  And  then  the  good  lady  said,  with  a  smile  so  know 
ing  as  to  amount  to  a  tremendous  wink:  "You  are  going  to  tell 
your  father  to-night  .  .  .  That's  right,  my  dear  — " 

Cally  gave  a  burst  of  gay  laughter,  declaring  that  there  was  not 
one  earthly  thing  to  tell. 

355 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Of  course,  darling,  mamma  understands,"  said  that  lady, 
promptly,  with  her  unconquerable  beam. 

And  a  few  moments  later  she  added: 

"Cally,  I  was  just  thinking  —  no  harm  in  being  forehanded, 
as  I  always  say!  .  .  .  Considering  all  the  circumstances,  what 
would  you  say  to  a  small,  dignified  home- wedding,  with  two  of 
four  bridesmaids,  and  a  large  breakfast  to  the  most  intimate 
friends?" 

Cally  was  even  more  amused.  .  .  . 

There  hovered  over  her  in  this  moment,  however  clearly  she 
knew  it,  an  immense  pressure,  born  both  within  and  without  — 
pressure  of  her  own  lifelong  mental  habits  and  ideals,  of  her  par 
ents'  wishes,  strengthened  by  the  family's  late  loss  of  prestige, 
pressure  of  public  opinion,  of  orthodox  standards,  of  manifest 
destiny,  of  the  whole  air  she  breathed  —  driving  her,  quite  irre 
spective  of  the  heart  question,  straight  to  brilliant  success  in 
Hugo's  waiting  arms.  The  wing  of  this  vast  body  brushed  Cally's 
cheek  now,  in  mamma's  cooing  notes.  She  felt  it,  but  only 
smiled.  A  new  strength  possessed  her;  she  was  her  own  girl  now 
as  never  before. 

"I'll  give  the  suggestion  due  thought,  mamma  dear  ...  I've 
an  engagement  now." 

Annie  knocked,  announcing  Mr.  Avery.  Cally  was  now  fully  ac 
coutred,  in  a  small,  queer  hat,  and  a  short  queer  wrap,  draping  in 
fantastically  above  the  knee  and  made  of  a  strange  filmy  ma 
terial  which  might  have  been  stamped  chiffon.  She  turned,  laugh 
ing,  at  the  bedroom  door,  and  her  mother,  no  sentimentalist, 
thought  that  she  looked  extraordinarily  pretty.  .  .  . 

"Good -night,  mamma.  .  .  .  Be  sure  to  remember  me  to 
Hugo." 

She  went  off  to  a  merry  evening  in  which  her  high  spirits  be 
came  a  matter  of  remark,  and  her  friend  Evey  McVey  considered 
that  they  were  the  least  bit  out  of  taste  —  "so  soon,  you  know/' 
So  Hugo  Canning  spent  the  evening  of  his  return  formally  rein 
stating  himself  in  the  good  graces  of  papa,  who  did  not  forget 
his  daughter's  unhappiness  of  the  summer  quite  so  easily  as 
mamma.  .  .  . 

356 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

But  next  day  Hugo  had  his  innings,  according  to  Mrs.  Heth's 
desire. 

He  had  been  in  Washington,  and  had  come  to  Carlisle  upon  an 
irresistible  impulse.  Steadily  magnetized  by  the  spirit  of  the 
"wild,  sweet  thing"  who  had  withstood  him  at  the  price  of  his 
hand,  yearning  had  once  more  conquered  pride,  and  again  he  had 
returned,  again  an  astonishment  to  himself.  In  view  of  such 
abasement  of  his  self-love,  he  had,  truth  to  tell,  expected  to  find 
Carlisle  fully  ready  for  the  immediate  rejoining  of  their  lives. 
But  perhaps  there  had  lingered  in  him  a  doubt  of  the  quality  of 
his  reception,  born  of  the  manner  of  their  parting;  and  her  hesita 
tion,  while  it  shook  his  vanity,  by  no  means  bade  him  despair. 
After  the  first  small  shock,  he  had  not  failed  to  perceive  the  coy 
ness  of  her;  and  why  not?  If  her  maiden's  whim  demanded  a 
brief  ritual  of  probationary  wooing  before  verbally  admitting 
him  to  her  heart  again,  never  fear  but  he  would  go  through  his 
paces  with  a  gallant's  air.  .  .  . 

The  day  was  what  photographers  call  cloudy-bright,  turning 
toward  mid-afternoon  into  fitful  sunshine.  The  young  pair 
lunched  a  deux  at  the  Country  Club,  nearly  deserted  at  this  hour 
on  a  week-day.  Hugo  had  stoutened  the  least  bit  under  his  sor 
rows;  he  was  more  masculine,  handsomer  than  ever;  his  manner 
did  not  want  his  old  lordliness,  even  now.  He  was  not  one  to  dis 
cuss  business  with  a  woman,  but  she  learned  of  the  affair  which 
was  hurrying  him  back  to  Washington,  nothing  less  than  rate- 
hearings  before  the  Interstate  Commerce  Commission,  if  you 
please.  The  able  young  man  was  now  assistant  counsel  for  his 
father's  railway.  However,  he  was  to  pass  this  way  soon  again, 
probably  next  week. 

They  sat  for  an  hour  on  the  club  piazza  looking  out  over  smooth 
rolling  hills,  now  green,  now  wooded,  all  fair  in  the  late  Septem 
ber  sunshine.  Away  to  the  left  there  was  the  faint  gleam  of  the 
river.  All  day  Canning,  in  his  subtle  way,  made  love  to  Cally, 
but  he  was  too  wise  to  press  hard  upon  her  girlish  hesitancy. 

"I  don't  believe  you've  missed  me  much,"  he  remarked,  once, 
on  the  wooing  note.  "Have  you?" 

Cally  smiled  into  space  and  answered:  "At  times." 

357 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"That's  cheerful  .  .  .  When  there's  not  been  an  hour  for  me, 
all  summer,  I  swear  it,  that  has  n't  been  singing  with  thoughts 
of  you." 

"You  might  have  run  up  from  Trouville,in  July,  and  called  on 
us  in  Paris." 

His  reply  indicated  that  running,  whether  up  or  down,  involved 
a  considerable  conquest  of  pride.  And  Cally  understood  that. 

"I,"  said  she,  tranquilly,  "have  been  growing  weary  of  society. 
Perhaps  that  is  your  doing.  ..." 

She  told  him  of  her  experience  at  the  Settlement  yesterday,  of 
her  rebuff  at  the  hands  of  Mr.  Pond.  Canning  thanked  heaven 
that  she  need  not  bother  herself  with  such  dreary  faddisms  of 
the  day. 

"You  can  safely  leave  all  that,"  said  he,  "to  the  women  who 
have  failed  in  their  own  careers." 

"And  what  career  is  that?" 

"The  career  of  being  a  woman.  Need  you  ask?" 

Carlisle,  drawing  on  her  gloves,  observed:  "That  would  bring 
up  the  question,  would  n't  it,  of  what  your  ideal  of  a  woman 
is." 

"For  five  cents,"  said  Hugo,  "I  will  tell  you  her  name." 

She  was  pleased  with  the  evidences  of  her  mastery  over  him. 
The  day  of  intimacy  brought  its  reactions,  automatically  creating 
romantic  airs.  When  the  time  came  for  him  to  go,  she  was  sorry; 
and  perhaps  just  a  little  uncertain  in  her  own  mind.  For  the  re- 
engagement  had  still  not  taken  place.  The  most  that  could  be 
said  was  that  an  "understanding"  existed,  to  the  effect  that  it 
would  take  place  on  his  return.  And  Canning,  for  his  part,  was 
not  dissatisfied  with  this  arrangement.  In  ten  days  he  would  come 
again,  and  take  the  wavering  outposts  by  storm. 

They  said  good-bye  in  the  drawing-room  at  home,  at  quarter 
before  five.  Cally  held  out  her  slender  little  hand.  Hugo  smiled 
down  at  it:  surely,  between  him  and  her,  an  odd  farewell.  But 
then,  as  his  clasp  tightened,  the  man's  smile  became  a  little 
twisted  on  his  handsome  lip. 

"When  I  part  from  you  again,  my  dear,"  said  he,  with  sudden 
huskiness,  "I  swear  it  won't  be  like  this." 

358 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


The  girl  looked  up  at  him.  He  raised  the  hand,  palm-upward, 
with  a  sort  of  jerk,  kissed  it,  dropped  it  abruptly,  and  was  gone. 

Cally  remained  standing  where  he  had  left  her;  this  time  she 
did  not  run  to  the  window.  She  glanced  at  the  hand  which  her 
lover  had  just  saluted,  and  was  conscious  of  a  subtle  want  in 
their  reunion.  .  .  . 

Hugo's  presence  in  the  body  had  brought  up  vividly  that  matter 
upon  which  they  had  broken  in  May.  Of  that  matter  he  had  said 
nothing,  either  yesterday  or  to-day.  His  manner  and  bearing  took 
the  clear  position  that  he  and  she  had  simply  had  a  lovers'  quar 
rel,  in  which  both  had  said  and  done  things  that  they  did  not 
mean.  But  Jack  Dalhousie  had  stood  in  the  background  of  Car 
lisle's  mind  all  day,  and  her  feeling  was  that  something  rather 
definite  should  have  been  said  about  him.  Possibly  Mrs.  Berkeley 
Page  had  something  to  do  with  this;  that  lady  had  left  behind  her 
an  indefinable  suggestion  of  invisible  standards,  of  appraisements 
differing  from  mamma's,  say.  Measuring  herself  unconsciously 
with  Hugo  to-day,  Cally  had  become  aware  that  in  carrying  out 
her  will  in  opposition  to  his  last  year,  she  had  derived,  not  merely 
strategic,  but  in  some  way  personal,  strength.  The  old  inequality 
had  mysteriously  disappeared.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth  came  gliding  through  the  portieres  from  the  hall.  Her 
face  was  one  vast  inquiry,  lit  by  beams;  it  made  an  uproarious 
demand  such  as  a  child  of  three  could  have  understood.  Still,  to 
avoid  any  possibility  of  misunderstanding,  mamma  briefly  gave 
voice : 

"Well?" 

Cally  laughed,  and  held  up  her  betrothal  finger,  which  was 
unadorned. 

"I'm  not,"  said  she. 

Mamma's  face  fell. 

"Don't  look  so  blank!"  said  the  daughter,  with  a  little  laugh 
and  shrug.  "It's  all  going  to  happen  next  week,  by  the  book.  .  .  . 
Don't  you  know  I'm  perfectly  safe?" 

Mr.  Heth  heard  Cally's  business  news  with  open  indignation. 
She  made  her  report  to  him  that  night,  just  after  dinner;  and  she 

359 


V.    V.  's     E 


yes 


saw  her  father's  business  manner  emerge  sharply  from  beneath 
his  genial  domesticity. 

The  "new  law"  was  an  old  story  to  the  owner  of  the  Cheroot 
Works.  He  kept  apprised  of  the  signs  of  the  times;  and  he  hap 
pened  to  know  in  some  detail  the  provisions  of  the  pernicious 
legislation  the  Labor  Commissioner  was  cooking  up  in  secret, 
—  "that'd  confiscate  two  years'  profits  from  every  near  mill  in 
town,"  said  MacQueen.  But  the  rest  was  news,  and  highly 
unwelcome  news.  To  fight  blackmail  legislation  against  pro 
gressive  business  was  comparatively  simple;  but  a  string  of  lies 
in  the  newspapers  made  a  more  insidious  assault,  injuring  a 
man's  credit,  his  standing  as  a  conservative  financier,  his  ability 
to  inspire  "confidence":  valuable  possessions  to  the  President  of 
the  Fourth  National  Bank,  and  already  indefinably  impaired  by 
the  sensational  family  matter  last  spring.  .  .  . 

"Vivian!  —  That  fellow!"  he  exclaimed,  recalling  not  only  the 
Severe  Arraignment,  but  the  cataclysm  in  the  House.  .  .  . 
"Why,  Cally!  I  thought  you  considered  him  sort  of  a  friend  of 
yours!" 

"Not  that,  exactly,"  said  Cally,  at  a  considerable  loss.  "Still, 
I  was  very  much  surprised.  ...  Do  you  mind  about  the  —  the 
articles,  particularly,  papa?" 

"I  do." 

"Is  n't  there  something  you  can  do  —  to  have  it  all  stopped? 
Could  n't  you  have  a  suit  —  or  — ?" 

Her  father  exploded.  She  had  touched  a  sore  point. 

"Sue!  Sue  a  lot  of  paupers  that  have  n't  got  a  shirt  to  their 
backs !  Put  'em  in  prison?  —  likely  with  a  lot  more  paupers  on 
the  jury,  thinkin'  a  successful  business  man's  anybody's  meat. 
Sue! — and  what '11  you  get?  I'll  tell  you!  An  impudent  — 
offensive  —  malicious  muckraking  of  your  own  private  busi 
ness.  .  .  ." 

Cally,  looking  at  papa's  indignant  face,  felt  much  drawn  to 
him.  However,  the  business  conversation  was  here  interrupted, 
Cally  being  called  away  to  the  telephone.  She  went,  wonder 
ing  intently  if  she  could  not  somehow  help  in  this  threatened 
trouble.  She  had  felt  an  impulse  toward  doing  something  use- 

360 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

ful.  What  more  useful  than  assisting  to  shield  her  father  from 
undeserved  abuse?  .  .  . 

"It's  only  me,  Cally,"  said  Henrietta  Cooney's  voice,  "or  I, 
as  they've  got  it  in  the  grammars.  I  just  called  up  to  tell  you 
not  to  forget  the  meeting  to-morrow. " 

"What  meeting,  Hen?" 

"I  see  I  did  well  to  call,"  came  over  the  wire,  on  the  wings  of 
the  Cooney  laugh.  "The  Saturday  meeting  at  the  Woman's 
Club,  cousin,  that  I  engaged  you  for  the  other  day.  I've  just 
heard  that  V.  V.  's  going  to  speak,  too,  which  made  me  want  you 
specially.  Don't  say  no." 

"Of  course  not.  I  want  to  go,  very  much." 

The  two  girls  lingered  a  moment  to  chat.  Henrietta  appeared 
characteristically  cheerful,  though  reporting  half  the  family  sick, 
and  Cousin  Martha  Heth  quite  low  in  mind  with  her  flatfoot. 
And  Cally's  manner  to  her  poor  relation  was  quite  friendly  to 
night,  without  any  special  effort.  Her  summer-time  suspicion 
that  Hen  was  actually  trying  to  "cheer  her  up"  had  by  now 
become  a  certainty  (Hen  did  not  know  about  Hugo,  of  course) ; 
and  which  of  her  own  girlhood  intimates  had  done  as  much? 
Further,  the  words  of  comfort  that  the  hard- worked  stenographer 
had  said  to  her,  the  day  she  got  home  from  Europe,  had  recently 
been  endorsed,  as  it  were,  in  a  most  distinguished  quarter.  A 
strange  thought  this,  that  there  was  a  point  of  similarity  be 
tween  Hen  Cooney  and  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page.  .  .  . 

But  when  Cally  left  the  telephone  she  was  not  thinking  of  these 
things  at  all.  She  was  thinking  that  to-morrow  she  would  both 
hear  and  see  Dr.  Vivian,  her  father's  enemy,  the  hard  religious 
fellow  who  could  so  easily  forget  the  troubles  of  others.  Her  duty 
on  the  occasion  seemed  to  become  quite  clear  to  her.  She  must 
speak  to  him,  try  to  induce  him  to  give  up  his  newspaper  articles, 
or  at  least  to  leave  her  father's  name  out  of  them. 

The  day  of  lovers'  reunion  was  somewhat  blurred  by  ending 
with  thoughts  such  as  these.  Hugo,  as  Carlisle  had  said,  could 
not  pop  back  after  months,  and  repossess  her  mind  and  heart  at 
a  bound.  He  did  it  pretty  successfully  during  the  evening,  while 
she  entertained  Robert  Tellford  and  James  Bogue,  2d,  who  cor- 

361 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

dially  hated  each  other,  in  the  drawing-room.  But  before  she  fell 
asleep  that  night,  Cally's  thoughts  had  turned  more  than  once  to 
V.  Vivian,  of  the  old  hotel  which  was  now  a  Settlement.  Why 
had  he  asked  her  to  go  to  the  Works  some  day,  and  why  had  he 
done  it  with  that  strange  look? 


XXVI 

Concerning  Women  who  won't  remember  their  Place,  and  a 
Speech  to  Two  Hundred  of  them,  by  Mr.  V.  F.,  no  less ;  also 
revealing  why  Hen  Cooney  never  found  V.  V.  in  the  Crowd 
around  the  Platform. 

IT  was  an  interesting  time  to  be  alive,  as  Hen  Cooney 
remarked  again  next  day.  Absorbing  matters  were  afoot 
in  the  old  town,  provided  that  you  had  an  eye  in  your 
head  to  see  them.  One  thing  led  to  another  with  startling  rapid 
ity.  Only  the  other  day,  it  seemed,  some  one  had  risen  and  flung 
against  the  ideals  of  generations  the  discordant  cry  of  Votes  for 
Women.  Rebukes  for  the  unseemliness  were  copious  and  stern 
enough.  Many  spoke  acidly  of  the  lengths  to  which  childless 
females  would  go  for  lack  of  occupation.  Droll  fellows  of  a  pretty 
wit  giggled  and  asked  who  would  mind  the  baby  while  the  madam 
went  out  to  vote.  Serious-minded  persons  of  both  sexes  disposed 
of  the  whole  foolishness  forever  by  saying  (and  wondering  why 
nobody  had  ever  thought  of  it  before)  that  woman's  place  was  the 
home.  But  few  there  were  who  perceived  a  symptom  here;  not 
even  when  the  League  grew  with  unintelligible  rapidity,  and 
croaking  diagnosticians  here  or  there  professed  to  see  other 
manifestations  not  unrelated. 

Cassandras  remarked  that  women  wearied  of  thinking  "  through 
their  husbands."  The  census  revealed  to  the  close  student  that 
some  women  even  had  no  husbands.  It  was  a  fact  that  year 
before  last  women  had  appeared  at  legislative  "hearings"  for  the 
first  time  in  the  history  of  the  State.  These  women,  plague  on 
them,  failed  to  fortify  the  wags  by  powdering  their  noses  in  front 
of  pocket  mirrors  while  they  talked,  or  making  sweet-eyes  at  the 
chairmen  of  committees.  They  appeared,  to  tell  the  honest 
truth,  with  late  reference-books  under  their  arms,  and  in  their 
heads  the  faculty  for  asking  the  most  annoying  sort  of  questions. 

363 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

More  than  one  honest  Solon  was  seen  to  stammer  and  turn  red 
under  their  interrogations,  so  often  stiffened  by  a  date  and  a  little 
figure  or  so. 

And  these  troublesome  "thinking  women"  had  not  retired 
when  the  legislature  did.  Editors  nowadays  were  often  surprised 
in  their  sanctums  by  committees  of  three  from  some  pestiferous 
unwomanly  club  or  other,  and  they  had  not  come,  alackaday,  to 
have  their  handkerchiefs  picked  up  with  courtly  speeches,  graced 
with  an  apt  quotation  from  "Maud."  The  Civic  Improvement 
League,  with  a  woman  president,  was  taking  a  continuous  interest 
in  matters  of  playgrounds  and  parks,  clean  streets  and  city  plan 
ning.  The  Society  for  Social  Progress,  almost  exclusively  feminine, 
was  continuously  astir  about  pure  milk  and  factory  laws,  birth 
rates  and  infant  mortality,  sociology  and  eugenics.  And  now 
here  was  the  conservative  Woman's  Club,  which  had  been  purely 
literary  and  social  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  holding  a  largely 
attended  symposium  on  How  Shall  We  Help  the  Poor? 

This  latter  meeting,  attended  by  Carlisle  Heth  and  her  cousin 
Henrietta  the  day  after  Canning  left,  was  no  doubt  a  trivial  and 
obscure  occurrence.  Not  an  earthly  thing  could  be  said  for  it, 
except  that  it  was  a  bubble  on  the  surface  of  an  unrest  which 
would  one  day  change  the  face  of  human  society.  .  .  . 

The  two  cousins,  having  come  a  little  tardy,  were  content  with 
seats  in  the  next  to  the  last  row.  The  Woman's  Club  inhabited 
an  old  family  mansion  on  Washington  Street,  —  bought  in  the 
legendary  age  when  land  was  not  computed  by  the  square  foot,  — 
and  its  assembly-rooms  were  the  one-time  parlors,  with  the 
dining-room  thrown  in  by  an  architectural  dexterity.  Perhaps 
two  hundred  women  could  be  seated  here,  and  all  seemed  to  be 
present  to-day.  Cally  regarded  serried  rows  of  feminine  backs, 
some  of  which  she  recognized.  The  little  platform  at  the  farther 
end  of  the  rooms  remained  empty,  and  the  place  was  abuzz  with 
murmured  talk.  Not  a  back  was  silent,  not  even  Henrietta's. 
Hen  was  saying  enthusiastically  that  nothing  like  this  could  have 
been  seen  ten  years  ago.  .  .  . 

Cally  caught  widening  glimpses  of  the  Cooney  meanings.  She 
had  been  like  a  rider  thrown  from  a  gay  fixed  steed  in  a  merry- 

364 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

go-round,  who,  having  picked  himself  up  and  mended  his  wounds, 
looks  about,  and  gets  his  first  view  of  the  carousel  as  part  of  a 
larger  moving  scene.  Cally,  for  the  first  time  in  her  life,  had  been 
glancing  over  the  fair-grounds.  Not  even  the  knowledge  of 
Hugo's  love  could  now  wholly  turn  her  gaze  backward. 

Pending  the  beginning  of  the  oratory,  clubbers  and  guests 
talked  to  the  contentment  of  their  hearts.  Cally  said  sud 
denly: 

"Hen,  why  is  it  that  men  are  so  opposed  to  this  sort  of 
thing?  " 

"It's  human,"  said  Hen,  "if  you  have  the  upper  hand,  not  to 
want  to  give  it  up." 

"You  mean  that  men  have  the  upper  hand  now?" 

"Have  n't  they?" 

A  tiny  little  woman  in  the  row  ahead  of  them  turned  round  and 
smiled  faintly  at  Henrietta.  She  had  a  face  like  a  small  doll's,  a 
button  of  a  nose  and  the  palest  little  china-blue  eyes  imaginable. 
Nevertheless,  this  woman  was  Mrs.  Slicer,  president  of  the  Fed 
eration  of  Women's  Clubs,  and  those  weak  eyes  had  once  stared 
a  Governor  of  a  State  out  of  countenance. 

"  Hen,  they  have,"  said  she,  in  a  fairy  voice;  and  so  turned  back 
to  her  own  affairs,  dropping  from  these  pages. 

Henrietta  presently  said:  "But  why  should  they  oppose  it, 
really,  Cally?  If  you  were  a  man,  would  you  insist  on  the  priv 
ilege  of  marrying  a  helpless  dependent,  your  mental  and  moral 
inferior?  Seems  to  me  I'd  rather  have  an  intelligent  comrade, 
my  superior  for  choice  — " 

But  Hen  discovered  that  her  voice  all  at  once  sounded  very 
loud.  There  was  a  sudden  lull  in  the  conversational  hum,  and  then 
a  burst  of  hand-clapping.  The  lady  president  of  the  Woman's 
Club  had  entered  at  the  head  of  the  rooms,  followed  by  the 
orators.  They  ascended  the  platform;  and  when  Cally  saw  but 
the  Mayor  of  the  city  and  Mr.  Pond  of  the  Settlement,  she  said 
at  once  to  Henrietta: 

"Why,  where's  your  friend  V.  V.?" 

"  Somewhere  up  at  the  front,  —  I  hope  I .  .  .  He  was  n't  one  of 
the  regular  speakers,  you  know.  .  .  ." 

365 


V.    V.  's      Eyes 

Hen  added  in  a  faint  whisper:  "I  doubt  if  he  knows  he's  going 
to  be  called  on—" 

Being  duly  presented  to  the  expectant  women,  his  Honor  the 
Mayor  spoke  first.  He  was  a  middle-aged,  mustachioed  Mayor, 
who  had  achieved  a  considerable  success  by  being  all  things  to  a 
few  men,  but  those  the  right  ones.  His  reputation  as  an  orator 
was  well  deserved,  but  his  ability  to  make  one  speech  serve  many 
occasions  had  been  commented  upon  by  carpers  here  and  there. 
See  the  files  of  the  "Post,"  passim.  To-day  his  thesis  was  organ 
ized  charity,  lauded  by  him,  between  paragraphs  of  the  set  piece, 
as  philanthropy's  great  rebuke  to  Socialism.  And  thrice  his 
Honor  spoke  of  the  glorious  capital  of  this  grand  old  common 
wealth  ;  twice  his  arm  swept  from  the  stormy  Atlantic  to  the  sun- 
kissed  Pacific;  five  times  did  he  exalt,  with  the  tremolo  stop,  the 
fair  women  of  the  Southland.  .  .  . 

"The  dinner-bell  of  the  house!"  said  Hen,  sotto  wee,  as  the 
orator  sat  down,  smiling  tiredly  amid  familiar  applause.  "Don't 
be  discouraged  yet,  Cally." 

Director  Pond,  having  been  most  flatteringly  introduced, 
received  an  ovation,  half  for  the  man  and  his  work,  half  from  the 
wish  of  a  kindly  people  to  bid  the  stranger  welcome.  He  spoke 
half  as  long  as  the  Mayor,  and  said  four  times  as  much :  so  much 
space  did  he  save  by  saying  nothing  whatever  about  the  fair 
women  of  the  Southland,  and  by  absolutely  avoiding  all  meta 
phors,  tropes,  synecdoches,  or  anacolutha.  Mr.  Pond  assaulted 
the  Mayor's  apotheosis  of  charity,  particularly  as  applied  to  his 
own  institution.  He  described  the  Settlement,  not  as  a  dispensary 
for  old  clothes,  but  as  a  cultivated  personality,  an  enlightened 
elder  brother  gone  to  live  with  the  poor.  It  aspired  to  enrich  life 
through  living,  said  he,  to  bring  light  to  the  disinherited  and  the 
gift  of  a  wider  horizon.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Pond  followed  his  thought  with  more  imagination  than 
one  might  have  thought  him  to  possess,  and  with  a  glow  on  his 
dark  face  such  as  had  not  been  observed  there  the  other  day. 
Cally,  from  the  next  to  the  last  row,  listened  attentively  enough; 
she  recalled  that  she  would  see  Mr.  Pond  this  evening,  perhaps 
sit  next  to  him,  at  mamma's  Settlement  dinner.  However,  she 

366 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

reserved  her  chief  interest  for  Hen's  friend  V.  V.,  who  was  so  mer 
ciless  in  his  attitude  toward  those  who  were  not  poor.  Mr.  Pond 
spoke  straightforwardly,  not  to  say  bluntly.  But  she  pictured 
Vivian  as  shaking  the  rafters  with  his  shameless  homicides  and 
God-pity-yous.  .  .  . 

"Once  the  bread  and  meat  question's  settled,  money  is  of 
secondary  importance,"  said  the  Director's  deep  voice.  "Let's 
get  that  well  into  our  heads.  What  the  poor  ask  is  that  they  shall 
not  be  born  under  disadvantages  which  the  labor  of  their  life 
times  can  never  remove.  ..." 

Only  these  two  speakers  had  been  announced.  When  Pond  sat 
down  the  formal  exercises  were  over.  But  as  his  applause  died 
away,  the  president  of  the  club  rose  again,  sure  enough,  —  while 
Henrietta  excitedly  nudged  Carlisle,  — and  announced  an  added 
speaker,  a  guest  of  the  club  to-day,  whom  she  described  as  the 
young  father  of  the  Settlement.  The  president  —  a  tall,  placid- 
faced  woman,  with  a  finely  cut  chin  and  a  magnificent  crown  of 
silver  hair  —  had  something  to  say  about  the  spirit  of  pure  ideal 
ism;  and  was  sure  that  the  members  would  be  glad  to  hear 
remarks  on  the  subject  of  the  day  from  young  Dr.  Vivian,  the 
missionary  doctor  of  the  Dabney  House.  .  .  . 

The  few  kind  words  elicited  somewhat  perfunctory  plaudits, 
despite  Hen  Cooney's  single-handed  attempt  to  stampede  them 
into  a  triumph.  The  Clubbers,  truth  to  tell,  were  by  now  dis 
posed  to  leave  oratory  and  the  uplift  for  small- talk  and  tea. 

"  There  he  is!"  said  Hen,  clapping  splendidly. 

V.  Vivian  stood  on  the  platform,  beside  a  tall  oak-stand  and  a 
water-pitcher,  gazing  out  over  phalanxes  of  women.  His  youth- 
fulness  was  a  matter  of  general  notice.  By  contrast  with  the 
Mayor's  seamy  rotundity  and  Pond's  powerful  darkness,  he 
looked,  indeed,  singularly  boyish  and  fair.  He  was  undoubtedly 
pale,  and  his  face  wore  an  odd  look,  a  little  confused  and  slightly 
pained.  This,  combined  with  his  continuing  silence,  gave  rise  to 
a  general  suspicion  that  the  young  man  had  fallen  a  victim  to 
stage-fright.  However,  the  odd  struggle  going  on  in  him  at  his 
unexpected  opportunity  was  not  against  fear.  .  .  . 

Carlisle  regarded  Vivian  intently,  over  and  through  scores  of 

367 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


women's  hats.  She  was  inwardly  braced  for  epithets.  Some 
where  in  the  air  she  heard  the  word  "anarchist";  but  a  woman 
sitting  near  her  said,  quite  audibly,  —  "Looks  more  like  a 
poet,"  .  .  .  meaning,  let  us  hope,  like  a  poet  as  we  like  to  think 
that  poets  look;  and  not  as  they  so  often  actually  look,  by  their 
pictures  in  the  magazines.  .  .  . 

"I  suppose  the  beginning  of  helping  the  poor,"  suddenly  spoke 
up  the  young  man  on  the  stand,  in  a  voice  so  natural  and  simple 
as  to  come  as  a  small  shock,  "is  to  stop  thinking  of  them  as  the 
poor.  There  are  useful  people  in  the  world,  and  useless  people; 
good  people  and  bad  people.  But  when  we  speak  of  poor  people 
and  rich  people,  we  only  make  divisions  where  our  Maker  never 
saw  any,  and  raise  barriers  on  the  common  which  must  some  day 
all  come  down." 

The  speaker  pushed  back  his  blond  hair  with  a  gesture  which 
Cally  Heth  had  seen  before.  However,  all  else  about  him,  from 
the  first  sight,  had  seemed  to  come  to  her  in  the  nature  of  a 
surprise.  .  .  . 

"The  things  in  which  we  are  all  alike,"  said  the  tall  youth,  with 
none  of  the  Mayor's  oratorical  thunder, "  are  so  much  bigger  than 
the  things  in  which  we  are  different.  What 's  rich  and  poor,  to  a 
common  beginning  and  a  common  end,  common  sufferings,  com 
mon  dreams?  We  look  at  these  big  freeholds,  and  money  in  bank 
is  a  little  thing.'  On  Washington  Street,  and  down  behind  the 
Dabney  House  —  don't  we  each  alike  seek  the  same  thing?  We 
want  life,  and  more  life.  We  want  to  be  happy,  and  we  want  to 
be  free.  Well  —  we  know  it 's  hard  to  win  these  prizes  when  we  're 
poor,  but  is  it  so  easy  when  we  're  rich?  To  live  shut  off  on  a  little 
island,  calling  the  rest  common  and  unclean  —  is  that  being 
happy  and  free,  is  it  having  life  abundantly?  I  look  around,  and 
don't  find  it  so.  And  that's  sad,  is  n't  it?  —  double  frustration, 
the  poor  disinherited  by  their  poverty,  the  rich  in  their  riches.  .  .  . 
Don't  you  think  we  shall  find  a  common  meeting-place  some  day, 
where  these  two  will  cancel  out  ?  .  .  .  when  reality  will  touch 
hands  with  the  poet's  ideal  — 

And  the  stranger  hath  seen  in  the  stranger  his  brother  at  last, 
And  his  sister  in  eyes  that  were  strange  ..." 
368 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

The  slum  doctor  paused.  The  confused  appearance  was  gone 
from  his  face;  he  looked  now  introspective,  quite  without  con 
sciousness  of  himself;  rather  like  a  man  listening  with  somewhat 
dreamy  approbation  to  the  words  of  another.  And  Cally,  having 
felt  her  antagonism  mysteriously  slipping  away  from  the  mo 
ment  her  eyes  rested  upon  his  face,  now  knew,  quite  suddenly 
and  definitely,  that  she  was  n't  going  to  speak  to  him  about  the 
articles. 

The  knowledge,  the  whole  matter,  was  curiously  disturbing  to 
her.  Where  was  the  hostile  hardness  of  the  religious  fellow,  jus 
tifying  distrust  and  dislike?  Why  should  her  father's  attacker 
make  her  think  now,  of  all  times,  of  that  night  in  Hen's  parlor, 
the  morning  on  Mr.  Beirne's  doorstep,  that  rainy  May-day  in  his 
Dabney  House  when  he  had  overwhelmed  her  with  the  knowl 
edge  of  his  superiority?  .  .  . 

"  And  —  and  —  I  think  women  should  be  especially  interested 
in  all  that  makes  for  a  new  common  freedom,"  observed  the 
youthful  speaker,  "for  they  have  suffered  somewhat  in  that  way 
—  have  n't  they?  .  .  .  [Applause,  led  by  Miss  Cooney.]  You 
know  the  processes  of  history  —  how  men,  first  of  all  by  superior 
muscle,  have  made  it  a  man's  world.  .  .  .  Till  to-day,  large 
groups  of  women  find  themselves  cribbed  and  cabined  to  a  sin 
gle  pursuit,  marriage :  surely  the  noblest  of  all  callings,  but  — 
perhaps  you  will  agree  with  me  —  the  meanest  of  all  professions. 
I,  for  one,  am  glad  to  see  women  revolting  from  this  condition, 
asking  something  truer,  something  commoner,  than  chivalry. 
For  that,  I  say,  steps  the  march  to  the  great  goal,  a  boundless 
commonwealth,  a  universal  republic  of  the  human  spirit.  It 
seems  to  me  we  need  to  socialize,  not  industry,  but  the  heart 
of  Man  to  his  brother.  Rich  and  poor,  men  and  women  —  God, 
I  am  sure  of  it,  meant  us  all  to  be  citizens  of  the  world.  .  .  ." 

A  certain  self-consciousness  seemed  here  to  descend  upon  the 
tall  orator.  He  ceased  abruptly,  and  disappeared  from  the  plat 
form,  having  neglected  to  make  his  bow  to  the  chairman. 

Then  the  moment's  dead  silence  was  suddenly  exploded  with 
a  burst  of  clapping,  quite  as  hearty  as  Mr.  Pond  had  received, 
and  really  something  like  the  "storm"  we  read  about.  And  in 

369 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

the  din,  Henrietta  Cooney  was  heard  crying,  with  a  passion  of 
pride: 

"Well,  it's  about  time!  ...  It's  the  first  thing  V.  V. 'sever 
got  —  the  first  tribute A  boy  like  that  —  " 

Hen,  curiously,  was  winking  a  little  as  the  two  girls  rose.  And 
she  added  in  a  moved  voice,  as  if  seeking  to  explain  herself: 

"  Well,  think  of  the  hard  life  he  has  down  there,  Cally,  —  no 
pleasure,  no  fun,  no  companionship. .  .  .  And  this  is  the  first 
notice  of  any  kind  ..." 

The  meeting  was  over.  The  crowded  parlors  were  in  a  hubbub. 
Colored  servants  entered,  taking  away  the  camp-chairs.  A  gen 
eral  drift  toward  the  platform  was  in  evidence.  And  Cally,  stand 
ing  with  the  others  and  ready  to  go,  seemed  to  see  no  clear 
course  at  all  among  the  disturbing  cross-currents  which  she  sud 
denly  felt  within  her,  impelling  her  now  this  way,  now  that.  If 
she  could  not  think  of  V.  Vivian  as  hard  now,  exactly,  a  new 
"  attitude "  was  obviously  needed,  consistent  with  her  duty  to 
papa.  It  must  be  that  the  strange  young  man  was  obsessed  by 
beautiful  but  impossible  ideas  about  the  equality  of  the  poor 
and  so  on.  Carried  away  by  excessive  sympathies,  he  took  wild 
extreme  views.  .  .  . 

"Are  you  going  to  stay  for  tea,  Hen?"  she  asked,  amid  the 
stir  and  vocal  noises  of  two  hundred  women. 

But  Hen  said  no;  getting  tea  for  the  Cooney  invalids  was  her 
portion. 

"We'll  just  stop  a  minute  and  speak  to  V.  V.,"  she  added,  as  if 
that  went  without  saying. 

But  this  time  Cally  said  no,  somewhat  hastily.  And  then 
she  explained  that  she  must  go  home  to  dress,  as  mamma  was 
having  some  people  to  dinner  to-night.  Hen  looked  disap 
pointed. 

"Well,  there's  no  chance  of  getting  near  him  now,  anyway. 
Look  at  that  jam  around  the  platform.  .  .  .  Stay  just  a  minute 
or  two,  Cally." 

The  two  cousins,  the  rich  and  the  poor,  and  looking  it,  strolled 
among  the  Clubbers,  Henrietta  speaking  to  nearly  everybody,  and 
invariably  asking  how  they  had  liked  Dr.  Vivian's  speech,  Pond 

370 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


and  the  Mayor  ignored.  She  also  introduced  her  cousin  right  and 
left,  and  enjoyed  herself  immensely. 

Cally,  having  matters  to  think  about,  again  remarked  that 
she  must  go.  She  saw  Hen  glance  hungrily  over  the  dense  lively 
crowd,  densest  around  the  platform,  and  promptly  added:  "  But 
of  course  you  must  n't  think  of  coming  with  me." 

Henrietta  hesitated.  "  You  would  n't  mind  if  I  stayed  on  a  min 
ute?  I  would  like  just  to  say  a  word  to  V.  V." 

Cally  assured  her.  "  And  thank  you  for  bringing  me,  Hen.  I  — 
had  no  idea  it  would  be  so  interesting." 

The  two  girls  parted.  Hen  plunged  into  the  Clubbers  to  speak 
to  Mr.  V.  V.  Cally  went  out  of  the  great  doors,  deep  in  thought. 
And  having  passed  through  these  doors,  the  very  first  person  she 
saw  was  Mr.  V.  V.  ... 

It  was  incredible,  but  it  was  true.  How  he  had  escaped  the 
handshakers  was  a  mystery  for  a  detective.  But  there  the  man 
indubitably  stood  at  the  head  of  the  Club  steps,  alone  in  the  gath 
ering  twilight,  bowing,  speaking  her  name.  .  .  . 

Had  he  been  waiting  for  her,  then?  A  certain  air  of  prepared 
surprise  in  his  greeting  rather  suggested  the  thought. 

"  Is  your  car  waiting?  "  inquired  the  orator,  courteously.  "  May 
[call  it  for  you?" 

Cally's  heart  had  jumped  a  little  at  the  sight  of  his  tall  figure, 
but  she  answered  easily  enough,  as  she  moved  toward  the  steps, 
that  she  was  walking. 

"Then  won't  you  allow  me  to  see  you  home?  ...  It's  get 
ting  rather  dark.  And  I  —  the  fact  is,  I  wanted  to  speak  to 
you." 

And  Cally  said,  far  from  what  she  had  planned  to  say  in  think 
ing  of  this  meeting: 

"If  you  like.  .  .  .  Only  you  must  promise  not  to  scold  me  about 
the  Works." 

He  gave  her  a  look  full  of  surprise,  and  touched  with  a  curious 
sort  of  gratification;  curious  to  her,  that  is,  since  she  could  not 
know  how  a  well-known  Labor  Commissioner  had  taxed  this 


I  promise,"  said  he. 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

As  they  took  the  bottom  step,  he  added,  in  a  controlled  sort  of 
voice: 

"  Please  tell  me  frankly  —  is  it  objectionable  to  you  to  —  to 
have  me  walk  with  you?" 

"Oh,  no,"  said  Cally. 

Down  forty  feet  of  bricked  walkway,  through  the  swinging  iron 
gates,  out  upon  the  public  sidewalk,  Carlisle  walked  silently 
beside  the  attacker  of  her  father,  the  religious  fellow  whom  Hugo 
Canning  so  disliked.  About  them  in  the  pale  dusk  tall  street-lights 
began  to  twinkle.  Over  them  hung  the  impenetrable  silence.  It 
was  but  three  blocks  from  the  Woman's  Club  to  the  House  of 
Heth.  They  had  traversed  half  of  one  of  them  before  Vivian  gave 
voice: 

"I  merely  wanted  to  say  this." 

And  on  that  they  walked  ten  steps  without  more  speech. 

"This,"  resumed  Mr.  V.  V.,  and  his  voice  was  not  easy.  "You 
must  have  thought  it  strange  the  other  day,  when  I  told  you  the 
—  the  work  I  had  taken  up.  ...  My  articles,  I  mean. ...  I  should 
know,  if  anybody  does,  that  you  —  your  family  —  have  had  much 
trouble  to  bear  of  late.  ...  It  seems  that  I  should  be  the  last 
person  to  do  what  will  bring  you  more  trouble  —  annoyance  cer 
tainly,  pain  perhaps.  ...  I  felt  that  I  wanted  you  to  know,  at 
least,  that  it  took  a  —  a  strong  necessity  to  make  me  go  into 
the  matter  —  at  this  time.  ...  I  wanted  to  tell  you  that  — 
personally  —  I've  been  very  sorry  about  it.  .  .  ." 

She  hesitated  a  moment,  and  then  said: 

"  I  don't  doubt  that.  ...  I  haven't  doubted  it  since  I  stopped 
to  think." 

And  if  this  was  disloyalty  to  papa,  Cally  felt  that  she  could 
not  help  it.  ...  What,  after  all,  did  she  know  about  it?  Surely 
it  was  all  a  men's  matter,  a  mere  question  of  "reform,"  in  which 
some  thought  one  way  and  some  another,  and  each  side  said 
hard  things  without  meaning  them  exactly.  Probably  papa  would 
be  the  last  person  to  wish  her  to  interfere. ,  .  . 

"Thank  you,"  he  replied,  it  seemed  with  feeling  in  his  voice. 
And  walking  on,  looking  straight  before  him,  he  added: 

"There  was  one  thing  more  ...   Ah  —  pardon  me." 

372 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


The  young  doctor  carried  a  cane,  but  used  it  principally  for 
swinging  and  lunging.  In  view  of  his  infirmity,  Cally  had  begun 
by  walking  more  slowly  than  was  her  custom.  It  had  soon  devel 
oped,  however,  that  he  was  a  rapid  walker,  and  of  absent-minded 
habit  as  well,  particularly  when  talking.  So,  throughout  the  brief 
walk,  her  difficulty  was  to  keep  apace  with  him. 

"What  you  said  just  now  —  my  scolding  you  about  the  Works. 
...  I  realize  that  it  must  have  seemed  peculiar  to  you,  and  —  and 
—  weak  —  unmanly  —  my  pursuing  you  so  about  a  —  a  —  purely 
business  matter.  Of  course  you  must  have  felt  that  if  I  had  criti 
cisms  to  make,  I  should  have  taken  them  to  your  father  — 
instead  of  inflicting  them  on  you,  all  the  time." 

He  paused;  but  the  girl  said  nothing.  She  had,  in  fact,  specu 
lated  considerably  on  this  very  point:  how  could  she  posssibly 
have  any  responsibility  for  the  way  papa  ran  his  business?  It 
occurred  to  her  to  ask  the  man  plainly  whether  he  considered 
that  she  had;  but  she  did  not  do  so,  perhaps  fearing  that  he  might 
reply  in  the  affirmative.  .  .  . 

"I  once  tried  to  explain  it,  in  a  way,"  he  went  on,  hurriedly. 
"I  said  that  I  did  n't  know  your  father.  .  .  .  You  naturally  con 
sidered  that  merely  a  —  a  foolish  sort  of  —  claim  —  explaining 
nothing.  I  suppose  you've  forgotten  all  this,  but  — " 

"No,  I  remember." 

"Then  let  me  say  that  —  the  other  day,  when  I  saw  you  —  I 
had  no  idea  of  mentioning  the  Works  to  you,  other  than  to  explain 
my  position  —  not  an  idea.  .  .  .  And  then,  when  we  talked  — 
well,  I  did,"  he  said  with  a  kind  of  naked  ingenuousness,  as  if  no 
one  could  have  been  more  surprised  about  it  all  than  he.  ...  "I 
can't  explain  it,  so  that  it  won't  still  seem  peculiar  to  you.  .  .  . 
It's  only  that  I  do  feel  somehow  that  —  that  knowing  people 
makes  a  great  difference  —  in  certain  respects.  .  .  ." 

"I  — think  I  can  understand  that." 

"It's  generous  of  you  to  be  willing  to  try." 

"No,"  said  Cally,  pulling  her  veil  down  at  the  chin,  and  quick 
ening  her  steps  as  he  strode  on,  "I 'm  only  trying  to  be  —  reason 
able  about  it." 

They  were  passing  people  now  and  then  in  the  twilight  street, 

373 


V.    V.  's     Eves 

4 

most  of  whom  Cally  spoke  to;  and  once  she  thought  how  sur 
prised  Hugo  would  be,  could  he  look  over  from  Washington  and 
see  her  walking  amiably  in  this  company.  But  then  Hugo  might 
have  thought  of  these  matters  last  year,  when  he  said  she  was  n't 
the  girl  he  had  asked  to  marry  him. 

"Besides,"  said  she,  suddenly,  "you  don't  mean  to  say  any 
thing  —  terribly  bad  about  the  Works  in  the  articles  —  do 
you?" 

"Yes,  terribly,"  replied  Mr.  V.  V.,  leaving  her  completely 
taken  aback. 

He  added,  formally,  after  a  step  or  two:  "I  —  ah  —  should  n't 
feel  honest  if  I  left  you  in  the  slightest  doubt  —  on  that  point." 

But  she  could  not  believe  now  that  his  articles  would  be  so  ter 
rible,  no  matter  what  he  said,  and  her  strange  reply  was: 

"Then  —  suppose  we  don't  talk  about  it." 

He  said:  "I  feel  it's  better  so."  And  then  they  walked  on 
rapidly  in  silence. 

And  somewhere  in  this  silence,  it  came  over  Cally  that  the 
reason  she  could  not  distrust  this  man  was  because,  in  a  very 
special  way,  she  had  learned  to  trust  him;  could  not  dislike  him 
because  the  truth  was  that  in  her  heart  she  liked  him  very  much. 
And  people  must  act  as  they  felt.  And  then  her  thought  sud 
denly  advanced  much  further,  as  if  mounting  the  last  step  in  a 
watch-tower:  and  Cally  saw  that  the  question  between  herself 
and  V.  Vivian  had  always  been,  not  what  she  might  think  of 
him,  but  what  he  thought  of  her.  .  .  . 

The  fruitful  pause  ran  rather  long.  She  considered  compli 
menting  Mr.  V.  V.  upon  his  speech,  expressing  her  surprise  at  his 
unlooked-for  gentleness  on  the  subject  of  the  poor.  How  could 
one  who  spoke  so  kindly  write  terrible  articles  in  the  newspapers, 
attacking  one's  own  father?  Cally  wondered,  missing  the  per 
fectly  obvious  point  of  it  all,  namely:  that  when  a  man  is  a  guest 
at  a  woman's  club,  his  particular  task  is  to  look  sharp  to  his 
tongue,  ruling  with  a  strong  hand  what  besetting  weakness  he 
may  have  for  grim  speech,  and  abhorring  .  .  . 

But  the  whole  subject  was  difficult  to  the  girl,  and  it  was  he 
who  broke  the  silence,  speaking  his  pedestrian's  apology  again. 

374 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

And  this  time,  so  swift  and  straight  had  they  come,  Cally  replied, 
with  quite  a  natural  laugh: 

"Never  mind.  .  .  .  Here  I  am." 

She  halted  before  the  white-stone  steps  of  home,  and  glanced 
involuntarily  toward  the  windows.  Independent  though  she  felt 
since  day  before  yesterday,  she  would  not  have  cared  to  have 
mamma  glance  out  just  then.  .  .  . 

"I  had  n't  realized  that  we  were  here  already!" 

"  Oh,  it  is  n't  far,  as  you  see.  .  .  .  But  it  was  good  of  you  to 
bring  me." 

It  was  a  parting  speech;  but  Cally  said  it  with  no  inflection 
of  finality.  So,  at  least,  it  seemed  to  be  considered.  V.  Vivian 
stood  drawing  O's  with  his  stick  on  the  flagging  belonging  to  Mr. 
Heth,  of  the  Works.  He  took  some  pains  to  make  them  exactly 
round. 

"I  hope,"  said  he,  "that  your  —  your  annoyance  over  this 
matter  won't  interfere  with  your  interest  in  the  Settlement.  I 
hope  you  still  think  of  —  of  helping  in  the  work." 

"Oh!  ...  I  don't  know,"  replied  Cally,  having  thought  but 
little  about  this  since  Hugo's  reentrance  into  her  life.  "  Mr. 
Pond,  you  see,  convinced  me  pretty  well  of  my  uselessness  —  " 

"It's  only  his  manner!  —  he's  always  so  mortally  afraid  that 
people  aren't  in  earnest.  I'm  certain  he  could  find  —  ah  — 
suitable  and  congenial  work,  if  you  —  you  cared  to  give  him 
another  chance.  And  I  'm  certain  you  'd  like  him,  when  you  knew 
him  a  little  better." 

"You  like  him?" 

"I  put  him  above  any  man  I  know,  except  only  Mr.  Dayne." 

The  tall  electric  light  four  doors  below,  which  so  irritated  the 
Heths  when  they  sat  on  their  flowered  balcony  on  summer  nights, 
shone  now  full  upon  the  old  family  enemy.  It  was  observed  that 
he  wore,  with  his  new  blue  suit,  a  quaint  sprigged  waistcoat  which 
looked  as  if  it  also  might  have  come  down  from  his  Uncle  Arm- 
istead,  along  with  the  money  he  had  given  away.  The  old-fash 
ioned  vestment  seemed  to  go  well  with  the  young  man's  face.  .  .  . 

Cally  stood  upon  the  bottom  step  of  the  House,  and  drew  her 
hand  along  the  rail.  It  had  occurred  to  her  to  tell  him  that  she 

375 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


would  probably  go  away  to  live;  but  now  she  only  said,  half- 
absently: 

"I  might  think  about  it,  and  let  you  know  later." 

And  then,  as  he  accepted  her  tone  as  dismissal,  and  his  hand 
started  toward  his  hat,  she  spoke  impulsively  and  hurriedly: 

"Tell  me,  is  it  your  feeling  that  this  matter  —  the  Works  - 
makes  it  necessary  for  us  to  —  to  go  on  quarreling?" 

The  two  stood  looking  at  each  other.  And  in  each,  in  this  mo 
ment,  though  in  differing  degree,  the  desire  for  harmoniousness 
was  meeting  the  more  intangible  feeling  that  harmony  between 
them  seemed  to  involve  surrender  in  another  direction. 

"How  could  it  be?"  said  the  man.  "It 's  what  I  Ve  been 
trying  to  say.  But  I  naturally  supposed  that  you  — " 

"I  supposed  so,  too.  It  seems  that  I  don't." 

She  looked  down  at  her  hand  upon  the  rail,  and  said:  "Don't 
misunderstand  me.  Of  course  I  think  that  papa  is  doing  what  is 
right.  Of  course  I  am  on  his  side.  I  think'your  sympathy  with  the 
poor  makes  you  extreme.  But  ...  you  asked  me  the  other  day 
to  try  to  see  your  point  of  view.  Well,  I  think  I  do  see  it  now. 
People,"  said  Cally,  with  a  young  dignity  that  became  her  well, 
"sometimes  agree  to  disagree.  I  feel  —  now  when  we've  quar 
reled  so  much  —  that  I'd  like  to  be  friends." 

The  tall  young  man  looked  hurriedly  away,  down  the  dusky 
street.  In  his  mind  were  his  articles,  shooting  about:  his  terrible 
articles,  where  surely  nobody  would  find  any  gentleness  to  sur 
prise  them.  They  were  the  best  thing  he  would  ever  do ;  precisely 
the  thing  he  had  always  wanted  to  do.  And  yet  —  well  he  knew 
now  that  he  had  no  joy  in  them.  .  .  . 

"It's  tremendously  generous  of  you,"  he  said,  mechanically. 

Cally 's  eyes  wavered  from  his  face,  and  she  answered:  "No, 
I'm  not  generous." 

Her  struggle  was  to  keep  life  fixed  and  constant,  and  all  about 
her  she  found  life  fluent  and  changing.  Or  perhaps  life  was  con 
stant,  and  the  fluency  was  in  her.  Or  perhaps  the  difficulty  was 
all  in  this  man,  about  whom  she  had  never  been  able  to  take  any 
position  that  he  did  not  shortly  oust  her  from  it.  Considering 
her  resolution  only  last  night,  she  too  had  thought,  when  she 

376 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


began,  that  she  was  carrying  generosity  to  the  point  of  downright 
disloyalty  to  papa.  By  what  strangeness  of  his  expression  did  he 
make  her  feel  that  even  this  was  not  generous  enough,  that  more 
was  required  of  the  daughter  of  the  Works  than  merely  with 
drawing  from  all  responsibility?  .  .  . 

V.  Vivian  regarded  the  lovely  Hun.  As  a  prophet  you  might 
glory,  but  as  a  man  you  must  face  the  music.  .  .  . 

"But  I  must  tell  you,"  he  began,  with  visible  effort,  "that  you 
—  you  will  feel  very  differently,  when  you've  seen  — " 

However,  she  interrupted  him,  raising  her  eyes  with  a  little 
smile,  sweet  and  somewhat  sad. 

"I'll  look  after  my  part  of  it,"  said  she;  and  there  was  her 
pledge  of  amity  held  out,  gloved  in  white.  "Do  you  think  you 
can  be  my  friend?" 

The  light  showed  another  change  in  the  young  man's  face. 
He  took  the  hand,  and  said  with  sudden  strange  feeling: 

"Let  my  life  prove  it." 

So  Cally  turned  away  thinking  that  she  had  found  that  rarest 
thing  among  men,  a  friend  of  women. 

And  Mr.  V.  V.  walked  off  blindly  up  the  lamplit  street,  his 
heart  a  singing  and  a  pain. 


XXVII 

Of  one  of  the  Triumphs  of  Catty's  Life,  and  the  Tete-a-t&e  fol 
lowing,  which  vaguely  depresses  her;  of  the  Little  Work-Girl 
who  brought  the  Note  that  Sunday,  oddly  remet  at  Gentlemen's 
Furnishings. 

CANNING  was  absent  more  than  two  weeks.  His  attorney's 
business  had  brought  entanglements  before  and  behind;  he 
was  by  no  means  a  free  man  even  now.  Not  all  the  powers 
of  government  could  have  detained  him,  we  may  be  sure,  had  he 
considered  such  detention  hurtful  to  the  dearest  matter  in  the 
world.  But  Canning,  in  the  peculiar  circumstances,  had  concluded 
that  a  period  of  meditation  was  well,  that  absence  made  the  heart' 
grow  fonder;  and,  if  human  calculations  are  worth  anything  at 
all,  his  conclusions  were  amply  justified.  Through  the  days  of  their 
separation  his  chosen  had  constantly  felt  upon  her  the  weight  of 
that  vast  intangible  pressure  which  pins  each  mortal  of  us,  except 
the  strong,  to  his  own  predestined  groove.  Chiefly  mamma,  but 
many  other  things,  too,  had  been  pressing  Cally  steadily  from 
thoughts  of  useful  deeds,  of  which  she  knew  so  little,  toward 
thoughts  of  Mrs.  Hugo  Canning,  of  which  she  knew  so  much. 
For  sixteen  days,  time  and  circumstance  had  played  straight  into 
her  lover's  hands.  .  .  . 

Hugo  paused  to  be  welcomed,  on  his  way  from  the  train. 
Olympian  of  mien,  and  beautifully  dressed,  he  looked  indeed 
exactly  the  sort  of  man  who  would  shortly  have  use  for  the 
contents  of  the  little  velvet  box,  at  this  moment  reposing  snugly 
in  his  waistcoat  pocket.  Still,  he  had  turned  up  the  collar  of 
his  big  travelling-coat,  and  a  slight  hoarseness  indicated  that  the 
throat  trouble  which  had  sent  him  south  last  year  had  returned 
with  the  first  frost. 

"I  can  draw  on  it  for  another  six  months'  furlough,"  said  he, 

378 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

meeting  Cally's  eyes  with  gay  meaning,  "just  as  soon  as  I  have 
need  for  such  a  thing." 

He  had  come  this  time  as  the  open  gallant,  Lochinvar  in  all 
men's  sight.  If  his  lady  desired  ceremonies  all  in  order,  in  sooth 
she  should  have  them.  For  the  first  week  of  his  absence,  he  had 
strategically  allowed  himself  to  be  lost  in  silence.  And  then  the 
postman  and  expressman  had  suddenly  begun  to  bring  reminders 
of  him,  letters,  bon-bons,  books  even,  flowers  every  day,  and 
every  day  a  different  sort.  Cally  greeted  him  wearing  out-of- 
season  violets  from  his  own  florist.  And  by  telegraph  to  the 
faithful  Willie  Kerr,  the  gifted  wooer  had  arranged  a  little  dinner 
for  his  first  evening,  to  give  his  official  courtship  a  background 
which  in  other  days  it  had  sometimes  lacked.  .  .  . 

"To  my  mind  it's  a  bore,"  said  he,  as  they  parted.  "Please 
expect  to  give  me  a  little  time  of  my  own  afterwards." 

The  occasion  was  no  bore  to  Carlisle.  She  recognized  it  as  one 
of  the  triumphs  of  her  life.  The  material  dinner  could  of  course 
be  no  better  than  the  New  Arlington  could  make  it;  but  then  the 
New  Arlington  was  a  hotel  which  supercilious  tourists  always 
mentioned  with  pleased  surprise  in  their  letters  home;  that  is,  if 
they  had  any  homes  and  ever  thought  of  writing  to  them.  And 
Cousin  Willie  Kerr,  having  got  "off  "  at  three- thirty  with  carte 
blanche  for  the  arrangements,  that  night  proved  that  the  world 
of  Epicurus  had  lost  an  artist  when  he  had  turned  his  talents 
to  commerce.  But  of  course  Carlisle's  triumph  lay  not  in  glow 
ing  candle-shades  or  masses  of  red  and  pink  roses,  not  in  delicate 
viands  or  vintages,  however  costly.  She  read  her  brilliance  in 
the  eyes  and  bearing  of  Hugo  Canning's  guests. 

They  sat  down  twelve  at  table.  Beside  Carlisle's  own  little 
coterie,  there  were  present  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Allison  Payne,  who, 
before  they  had  retired  to  the  country  to  bring  up  their  children, 
had  been  conspicuous  in  that  little  old-school  set  which  in 
cluded  Mrs.  Berkeley  Page:  simple-mannered,  agreeable  people 
these  were,  who  were  always  very  pleasant  when  you  met  them, 
but  whom  you  never  really  seemed  to  know  any  better.  And 
Mrs.  Payne,  who  was  Hugo's  first  cousin,  had  kissed  Carlisle  when 
they  met  in  the  tiring-room,  and  hoped  very  prettily  that  they 

379 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

were  going  to  be  friends.  Still  more  open  was  the  gratulation  of 
the  somewhat  less  exclusive.  Papa  had  been  detained  by  business, 
and  J.  Forsythe  Avery,  having  been  asked  at  the  last  moment  to 
fill  his  place,  had  broken  up  another  dinner-table  to  be  seen  at 
Canning's.  Unquestionably  he  must  have  recognized  a  doughty 
rival,  but  Carlisle,  who  sat  next  him,  easily  saw  how  high  she  had 
shot  up  in  his  pink  imagination.  As  for  dear  Mats  Allen,  her  late 
funeral  note  had  quite  vanished  in  loving  rapture,  with  just  that 
undercurrent  of  honest  envy  so  dear  to  the  heart  of  woman. 

"He's  simply  mad  about  you,  Cally!  The  way  he  looked  and 
looked  at  you!  .  .  .  And  he-never  even  listened  to  poor  little  me, 
chatting  away  beside  him,  and  frightened  out  of  my  wits  all  the 
time,  he's  so  lordly." 

This  was  when  dinner  was  over,  and  the  guests  were  strolling 
from  the  little  dining-room  for  coffee  in  the  winter  garden.  Cally 
smiled.  She  had  observed  that  most  of  her  best  friend's  time 
had  gone,  not  to  chatting  to  Hugo,  but  to  lavishing  her  delicious 
ignorance  and  working  her  telling  optic  system  on  J.  Forsythe 
Avery,  who  was  so  evidently  now  to  be  released  for  general  circu 
lation.  .  .  . 

Mats  seized  the  moment  to  inquire,  simply,  whether  she  or 
Evey  was  to  be  maid  of  honor;  and  Cally  then  laughed  merrily. 

"Perhaps  we  shall  have  it  done  by  a  justice  of  the  peace.  .  .  . 
Mats,  you  're  the  greatest  little  romancer  I  ever  saw.  How  you  got 
it  into  your  pretty  noddle  that  Mr.  Canning  has  the  faintest 
interest  in  me  I  can't  imagine.  .  .  ." 

Willie  Kerr,  too,  paid  his  tribute,  having  momentarily  with 
drawn  himself  from  mamma,  whose  loyal  escort  he  was  once 
more.  Willie  was  a  shade  balder  than  last  year,  when  he  had 
played  his  great  part  in  Cally's  life  and  then  sunk  below  her  hori 
zon;  a  shade  more  rotund;  a  shade  rosier  in  the  face.  But  he  was 
as  genial  as  ever,  being  well  lined  now  with  a  menu  to  his  own 
taste  and  an  exceptionally  good  champagne. 

"Knew he'd  comeback,  Carlisle,"  said  Willie,  standing  before 
a  florid  oil-painting  he  had  lured  her  into  a  parlor  to  look  at. 
"  Said  to  Eva  Payne  in  September  —  no,  August,  one  Sunday  it 
was  —  'Canning '11  be  back  soon  as  she  gets  home,'  s'l.  'Don't 

380 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

know  what  happened,  that  trouble  in  the  spring.  Don't  want 
to  know  —  none  of  my  business.  But  mark  my  words,  Eva 
Payne,'  s'  I,  'Hugo  Canning '11  be  back.'  Fact,"  said  Willie,  grin 
ning  cordially.  "Funny  how  I  knew.  And  don't  forget,  Carlisle, 
m'  dear,  't  was  your  Uncle  Cosmo  did  it  all!  Hey?  Remember 
that  tea  in  my  apartments  ?  Always  keep  a  spare  room  ready 
for  Uncle  Cosmo,  and,  by  gad,  I'll  come  and  spend  my  summers 
with  you." 

And  later,  Eva  Payne,  the  once  far  unattainable,  asked  Mrs. 
Heth  and  her  daughter  for  luncheon  on  Friday  —  "with  a  few 
of  our  friends."  Mamma  received  the  invitation  like  an  acco 
lade.  Truly  that  ten  thousand  dollars  might  well  have  remained 
in  bank,  subject  to  personal  check.  .  .  . 

The  little  dinner,  with  its  air  of  everything  being  all  settled, 
was  a  huge  success;  a  bit  too  huge  to  Hugo's  way  of  thinking. 
It  was  eleven  o'clock  before  he  really  had  a  word  with  Carlisle. 

"It  began  to  look  like  a  house-party,"  said  he.  ... 

They  were  alone  now  in  the  drawing-room  at  home,  a  room 
whose  dim  beautiful  lights  made  it  look  always  at  its  best  at 
night.  Mamma  had  just  gone  up.  Cally  stood  in  front  of  a  small 
plaque-mirror;  she  had  taken  off  her  wraps,  and  was  now  fluffing 
up  her  fine  ash-gold  hair  where  the  scarf  over  her  head  had 
pressed  it  down.  The  pose,  with  upraised  arms,  was  an  alluring 
one;  she  was  lithe,  with  a  charming  figure.  And  she  still  looked 
very  young,  as  fresh  as  a  rose,  as  new  as  spring  and  first  love. 

"  Cally,"  said  Canning,  behind  her  —  "  I  've  fallen  in  love  with 
your  little  name,  you  see,  and  I  'm  always  going  to  call  you  by  it 
after  this  —  Cally,  did  I  ever  mention  to  you  that  you  're  the 
prettiest  girl  I  ever  saw.  Only  pretty  is  not  the  word.  .  .  ." 

Cally  laughed  at  her  reflection  in  the  glass. 

"  You  could  never  have  fallen  in  love  with  me  —  or  my  name  — 
unless  you'd  thought  so.  ...  Could  you?" 

"  I  've  never  asked  myself.  But  I  could  fall  in  love  with  every 
thing  else  about  you,  too,  because  I've  gone  and  done  it." 

"I  wonder  .  .  .  Anyhow  none  of  the  other  things  matter 
much,  do  they?  I  can't  imagine  your  falling  in  love  with  a  hideos- 
ity,  no  matter  how  worth  loving  she  might  be." 

381 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Under  the  circumstances,  why  bother  to  try?" 

"It's  no  bother,  and  it's  intensely  interesting.  .  .  ." 

Canning  advanced  a  step.  Carlisle's  gaze  moved  a  little  and 
encountered  his  in  the  glass.  In  his  eyes  lay  his  whole  opinion  of 
one  half  the  human  world.  .  .  . 

11  Don't  look  at  me  in  that  proprietary  way.  .  .  ." 

Canning  laughed  softly.  He  was  fully  prepared  for  coquetry. 

"Proprietary!  It's  the  last  way,  my  dear,  I  should  venture  to 
look  at  you" 

She  had  allowed  him  to  linger,  certainly  with  no  blindness  as 
to  what  he  desired  to  say  to  her.  She  had  stood  there  with  no 
ignorance  that  the  moment  was  favorable.  But  now  something 
seemed  to  have  gone  amiss,  and  she  turned  suddenly,  frustrating 
whatever  loverly  intention  he  may  have  had. 

Carlisle  sat  down  in  a  circular  brocaded  chair,  in  which  gold 
back  and  gold  arms  were  one;  a  sufficiently  decorative  back 
ground  for  her  shining  decollete.  Hugo,  standing  and  fingering 
his  white  tie,  looked  down  at  her  with  no  loss  of  confidence  in 
his  handsome  eyes. 

"You've  changed  somehow,"  said  he.  "I  haven't  quite 
placed  it  yet.  Still,  I  can  feel  it  there." 

"  I  'm  older,  my  friend,  years  older  than  when  you  used  to  know 
me.  And  then  I'm  suffering  from  a  serious  bereavement,  too. 
I've  lost  my  good  opinion  of  myself." 

"Perhaps  I  can  be  of  some  help  in  restoring  it  to  you." 

"That  is  the  question.  .  .  .  Besides  ageing  immensely,  I'm  also 
getting  frightfully  modern,  you  see.  .  .  ." 

And  pursuing  this  latter  thought  a  little,  she  presently  re 
plied  to  him: 

"Oh,  no  —  sociology,  not  politics.  ...  I've  been  thinking  for 
some  time  of  inspecting  the  Works,  to  see  if  it  needed  repairs. 
How  horrid  of  you  to  laugh!  Don't  you  think  a  woman  should 
take  some  interest  in  how  the  money  is  made  that  she  lives 
on?  .  .  ." 

She  said  this  smiling,  in  the  lightest  way  imaginable.  Small 
wonder  if  Hugo  did  n't  guess  that  she  had  thought  twenty  times 
in  two  weeks  of  actually  doing  this  thing  she  spoke  of.  Still  less 

382 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


if  it  never  occurred  to  him  that  he  here  confronted  again  the 
footprint  of  the  condemned  revivalist  fellow,  lately  become  his 
beloved 's  sworn  friend.  .  .  . 

"Have  you  asked  your  father  that  question  yet?" 

"I  thought  I'd  better  get  the  advice  of  a  prominent  lawyer 
first.  Tell  me  what  you  think?" 

"The  point  would  early  arise  as  to  how  you  would  know,  on 
visiting  the  Works,  whether  or  not  it  needed  repairs.  You've 
inspected  many  factories,  of  course?" 

"That's  true!  —  I  know  nothing  in  the  world  about  it.  Of 
course  not!" 

She  spoke  with  a  sort  of  eagerness;  but  went  on  presently  in 
another  tone:  "Do  you  know,  I  really  don't  know  anything?  .  .  . 
I  've  never  thought  of  it  specially  before,  but  all  at  once  I  'm  con 
stantly  being  impressed  with  my  ignorance.  ..." 

And  Hugo,  with  all  his  accomplishment  and  skill,  could  not 
thenceforward  bring  the  conversation  back  where  it  belonged. 
Only  the  time  and  the  place  were  his  to-night,  it  seemed.  .  .  . 

"I,"  said  the  girl,  "belong  to  the  useless  classes.  I  don't  pay 
my  way.  I  'm  a  social  deadbeat.  So  Mr.  Pond  told  me  the  other 
night.  You  must  meet  Mr.  Pond,  Hugo,  the  Director  of  the  Settle 
ment  you  gave  all  that  money  to  last  year.  He  can  be  as  horrid  as 
anybody  on  earth,  but  is  really  nice  in  a  rude  interesting  way. 
He's  packed  full  of  quarrelsome  ideas.  You  know,  he  does  n't 
believe  in  giving  money  to  the  poor  under  any  circumstances. 
Harmful  temporizing,  he  calls  it  ..."  A  rather  wide  sweep  here 
gave  Mr.  Pond's  views  on  poor  relief  in  detail  .  .  .  "Are  you  lis 
tening,  Hugo?  This  information  is  being  given  for  your  benefit. 
And  oh,  he  wants  me  to  learn  millinery  from  Mme.  Smythe 
(Jennie  T.  Smith,  nee)  and  help  him  start  a  class  in  hat-trim 
ming,  to  train  girls  for  shop  assistants.  Or  perhaps  I'll  learn 
cooking  instead.  ..." 

"He  seems  to  have  aired  his  views  to  you  pretty  thoroughly," 
said  Canning,  dryly. 

He  rose  to  go,  a  little  later,  rather  amused  by  the  skill  with 
which  he  had  been  held  off.  He  admired  the  piquancy  of  spirit 
with  which  she  took  advantage  of  the  altered  positions.  For  him 

383 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

tameness  was  the  great  disillusionizer;  his  undefined  ideal  was 
a  woman  who  must  be  won  anew  every  day.  Still,  he  had  been 
rubbed  a  little  the  wrong  way  by  the  new-woman  catch-phrases 
she  had  picked  up  somewhere,  by  the  faintly  argumentative  note 
in  her  conversation.  .  .  . 

"Plans  for  to-morrow!  ...  By  the  way,"  said  Cally,  glancing 
away  to  conceal  a  smile  as  she  rose,  "how  long  shall  you  be  in 
town?" 

"  Just  as  long,  Miss  Heth,  as  my  business  here  makes  neces 
sary." 

"What  can  I  say  to  that?  ...  If  I  say  I  hope  you  won't  be 
with  us  long,  it  sounds  quite  rude.  And  if  I  say  I  hope  it  will  be 
very,  very  long  .  .  ." 

But  he  would  not  follow  that  lead  now.  His  instinct,  her 
expression  warned  him;  and  he  was  fully  resolved  that  when 
he  spoke  again,  it  would  be  to  land  this  "wild  sweet  thing" 
fluttering  safe  in  his  net.  However,  his  laugh  was  not  quite 
natural. 

"I  may,"  said  he,  "get  a  telegram  calling  me  off,  at  almost 
any  minute.  Let  every  one  be  kind  to  the  stranger  within  the 
gates.  May  I  nominate  myself  for  luncheon?" 

He  was  unanimously  elected.  This  time,  at  parting,  he  did  not 
touch  his  former  betrothed's  hand.  His  bow  was  accompanied  by 
a  slightly  ironic  smile;  it  seemed  to  say:  "Since  you  prefer  it 
this  way,  my  dear  .  .  .  But  really  —  what's  the  use?" 

Cally,  snapping  out  the  lights,  felt  vaguely  depressed. 

Next  day,  half  an  hour  after  luncheon,  Hugo  said  to  the  great 
est  admirer  he  had  on  earth : 

"  Where  did  Carlisle  get  the  notion  that  she  wanted  to  go  in  for 
Settlement  work?" 

Mrs.  Heth's  reply,  delivered  with  a  beam,  was  masterly  in  its 
way. 

"Why,  my  dear  Hugo!  Don't  you  know  the  sorry  little  make 
shifts  women  go  to,  waiting  for  love  to  come  to  them?" 

Hugo's  comment  intimated  that  he  had  fancied  it  was  some 
thing  of  the  sort.  He  then  went  out,  to  his  future  mother-in- 

384 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

law's  regret;  she  often  wondered  how  it  was  that  she  and  Hugo 
had  so  few  good  talks. 

Her  two  young  people,  as  the  good  lady  loved  to  call  them 
once  more,  had  separated  almost  from  the  table,  but  soon  to  re- 
meet.  Carlisle,  having  spent  "the  morning"  shopping,  —  that 
is  from  twelve  o'clock  to  one-fifteen,  —  had  departed  to  finish  her 
commissions.  Canning  had  a  regretted  engagement  with  Allison 
Payne,  downtown,  to  advise  Mr.  Payne  touching  some  of  his 
investments.  But  he  was  to  pick  Carlisle  up  at  Morland's  estab 
lishment  at  four  o'clock,  with  the  car  he  had  hired  by  the  week; 
and  the  remainder  of  the  afternoon  would  belong  to  him  alone. 
He  was  to  have  the  evening,  too,  at  the  House,  following  a 
large  dinner-party  of  the  elders  arranged  by  Mrs.  Heth  before 
she  knew  the  date  of  his  return.  And  these  two  occasions,  the 
lover  resolved,  should  suffice  his  need.  .  .  . 

Cally  had  her  hour  in  the  shops,  enjoying  herself  considerably. 
Her  purchases  this  afternoon  were  partly  utilitarian,  it  was  true, 
concerned  with  Mrs.  Heth's  annual  box  to  her  poor  Thompson 
kin  in  Prince  William  County.  But  she  took  more  than  one  little 
flyer  on  her  own  account.  Nothing  more  had  Cally  said  to  her 
father  as  to  giving  him  back  the  fifteen  hundred  dollars,  dividend 
on  her  stock.  Consequently  she  bristled  with  money  nowadays, 
and  had  been  splurging  largely  on  highly  desirable  little  "extras." 
And  mamma,  usually  quite  strict  in  her  accounts,  thought  of 
trousseaux,  and  only  smiled  at  these  extravagances. 

Cally  moved  in  her  destined  orbit.  From  shop  to  shop,  she 
pleasurably  pursued  the  material.  Nevertheless,  she  cogitated 
problems  as  she  bought;  chiefly  with  reference  to  Hugo,  and  the 
two  or  three  hours'  tete-a-tete  that  waited  just  ahead.  ...  At 
just  what  point  should  the  needs  of  discipline  be  regarded  as 
satisfied?  That  was  the  question,  as  she  had  remarked  last  night. 

At  Baird  &  Himmel's  these  knotty  reflections  were  inter 
rupted  for  a  space.  In  this  spreading  mart  Cally  chanced  to  fall 
in  with  an  acquaintance. 

Baird  &  Himmel's  was  the  great  popular  department  store  of 
the  town,  just  now  rapidly  flowing  over  its  whole  block,  and  build 
ing  all  around  the  usual  drug-store  which  declined  to  sell.  Here 

385 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

rich  and  poor  rubbed  elbows  with  something  like  that  human 
equality  so  lauded  by  Mr.  V.  V.  and  others.  And  here  Cally  had 
pushed  her  way  to  Gentlemen's  Furnishings,  her  purpose  being  to 
buy  two  shirts  for  James  Thompson,  Jr.,  neck  size  13,  and  not  to 
cost  over  one  dollar  each,  as  mamma  had  duly  noted  on  the 
memorandum. 

It  was  ten  minutes  to  four  o'clock,  as  a  glance  at  her  watch  now 
showed.  Cally  swung  a  little  on  her  circular  seat,  and  encountered 
the  full  stare  of  a  girl  of  the  lower  orders,  seated  next  her.  Her 
own  glance,  which  had  been  casual,  suddenly  became  intent:  the 
girl's  face,  an  unusual  one  in  its  way,  touched  a  chord  somewhere. 
In  a  second  Cally  remembered  the  little  factory  hand  who  had 
brought  her  the  note  from  Dr.  Vivian,  that  fateful  Sunday  after 
noon  in  May.  .  .  . 

The  little  creature  bobbed  her  head  at  her,  with  the  begin 
nings  of  an  eager  smile,  which  did  not  change  her  wide  fixed  stare. 

"Good  evenin',  ma'am  —  Miss  Heth." 

"Good  afternoon " 

No  more  talk  there  had  been  about  the  Works  at  home,  other 
than  as  to  papa's  plan  to  have  Mr.  and  Mrs.  O'Neill  to  dinner,  to 
talk  over  matters  in  a  friendly  way.  But  if  Cally  had  desired  a 
sign  of  how  much  this  subject  had  been  on  her  mind  since  her  talk 
with  Vivian  she  could  have  found  it  in  the  mingling  sensations 
that  rose  in  her  now.  For  this  little  apparition  at  her  elbow  —  so 
she  had  learned  incidentally  through  Hen  Cooney,  who  knew 
everything  —  was  the  connecting  link  in  the  whole  argument. 
Here,  on  the  next  seat,  sat  that  "strong  necessity"  which  had 
impelled  Vivian  to  attack  Mr.  Heth  in  the  papers. 

"I  remember  you,"  said  Carlisle,  slowly.  "I  understood  from 
Miss  Cooney  that  you  had  been  very  sick.  You  don't  look  sick 
especially." 

"I  been  away,  ma'am.  On  a  Trip,"  explained  the  pale  opera 
tive  with  a  kind  of  eagerness.  "  Dr.  Vivian  he  sent  me  off  to  Atlan 
tic  City,  in  New  Jersey,  and  then  to  a  hotel  in  the  Adriondacts. 
conv'lessed,  ma'am,  y'  know?" 

"I  see.  Now  you  are  going  back  to  the  Works,  I  suppose?" 

It  was  not  a  question  easy  to  answer  with  delicacy,  to  answ< 

386 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

and  avoid  all  risk  of  hurting  a  lady's  feelings.  How  explain  that 
the  Works  were  expressly  prohibited  by  doctor's  orders,  though 
you  yourself  knew  that  you  ought  to  go  back?  How  tell  of  spe 
cial  lessons  at  a  Writing  Desk  every  night,  such  as  prepared  people 
to  be  Authors,  when  anybody  could  see  by  looking  at  you  that  you 
were  only  a  work-girl,  and  you  yourself  felt  that  it  was  all  wrong 
someway?  .  .  . 

Kern  spoke  timidly,  though  her  wide  eyes  did  not  falter. 

"Well  —  not  just  to-reckly,  ma'am.  The  plan  was,  till  I  got 
my  strength  back,  that  I  might  lay  off  a  little  and  go  —  go  to 
School." 

"I  see." 

The  tone  was  cool,  and  the  girl  added  with  a  little  gasp: 

"And  then  go  back  to  bunchin'  again,  —  yes,  ma'am.  It's  — 
it's  my  trade.  .  .  ." 

Many  feelings  moved  in  Cally,  and  it  might  be  that  the  best 
of  them  were  not  uppermost.  Perhaps  the  glittering  material 
possessed  her  blood,  even  more  than  of  habit.  Perhaps  it  was 
only  her  instinct  warning  her  to  take  her  stand  now  with  her 
father,  where  was  safety  and  her  ordered  course.  Or  at  least  it 
was  hardly  a  pure  impulse  of  generosity  that  made  her  open  the 
plump  little  gold  bag  at  her  side,  and  produce  a  bill  with  a  yellow 
back. 

"  I  'm  very  sorry  you  've  been  ill,"  she  said,  in  her  pretty  modu 
lated  voice.  "  As  you  probably  feel  that  you  got  your  illness  in  the 
Works,  I  should  like  you  to  take  this.  Please  consider  it  as  com 
ing  from  my  father  —  and  buy  yourself  something  — " 

All  the  blood  in  the  little  creature's  body  seemed  to  rush  head 
long  to  her  face.  She  shrank  away  as  from  something  more  pain 
ful  than  a  blow.  But  all  that  she  said  was: 

"Oh!  .  .  .Ma'am!" 

It  was  Miss  Heth's  turn  to  show  a  red  flag  in  her  cheek. 

"You  don't  want  it?" 

"I  —  why  ma'am,  —  I  could  n't  .  .  ." 

"As  you  like,  of  course." 

She  dropped  the  spurned  gift  back  into  her  bag,  with  studied 
leisureliness,  and  rose  at  once,  though  she  had  made  no  purchase. 

387 


V.    V.'s    .Eyes 


Standing,  she  made  a  slight  inclination  of  her  prettily-set  head. 
And  then  Miss  Heth  was  walking  away  through  the  crowded  aisle 
with  a  somewhat  proud  bearing  and  a  very  silken  swish. 

And  Kern  Garland  swung  round  on  her  seat  at  Gentlemen's 
Furnishings,  staring  wide-eyed  after  her,  her  finger  at  her  lip.  ... 

No  fairy  coming-true  here,  indeed,  of  that  gorgeous  fever- 
dream  in  which  Miss  Heth  with  lovely  courtesy  informed  Miss 
Garland  that  she  had  been  a  lady  all  the  time.  But  consider  the 
Dream-Maker's  difficulties  with  such  far-flown  fancies  as  this: 
difficulties  the  more  perplexing  in  a  world  where  men's  opinions 
differ,  and  some  do  say  that  she  in  the  finest  skirt  is  not  always 
the  finest  lady.  .  .  . 

Yet  times  change,  and  we  with  them.  It  is  a  beautiful  thing  to 
believe  in  fairies.  In  the  valley,  men  have  met  angels.  Kern  sat 
staring  at  Miss  Heth's  retreating  back:  and  lo,  a  miracle.  When 
the  lovely  lady  had  gone  perhaps  ten  steps  down  the  aisle,  her 
pace  seemed  to  slacken  all  at  once,  and  she  suddenly  glanced 
back  over  her  shoulder.  And  then  —  oh,  wonder  of  wonders!  — 
Miss  Heth  stopped,  turned  around,  and  came  swishing  straight 
back  to  the  seat  beside  Kern  Garland. 

"  That  was  silly  of  me,"  said  the  pretty  voice.  "  You  were  quite 
right  not  to  take  it  if  you  did  n't  want  it.  .  .  ." 

Kern  desired  to  cry.  But  that  would  be  very  ridiculous, 
in  a  store,  and  doubtless  annoying  to  Others.  So  the  little  girl 
began  to  wink  hard,  while  staring  fixedly  at  a  given  point. 
You  could  often  pass  it  off  that  way,  and  nobody  a  whit  the 
wiser. 

"I've  happened  to  have  the  Works  on  my  mind  a  little  of 
late,"  added  Carlisle,  almost  as  if  in  apology.  "But  I  —  I'm 
really  glad  to  see  you  again." 

She  perceived  the  signs  of  agitation  in  the  little  work-girl,  and 
attributing  it  all  to  the  twenty-dollar  bill,  saw  that  she  must  pave 
the  way  to  a  conversation.  And  conversation,  now  that  the  ice 
was  broken,  she  eagerly  desired,  fascinated  by  the  thought  that 
this  girl  knew  at  first-hand  everything  about  the  Works. 

"Let  me  see  —  your  name  is  Corinne,  is  n't  it?" 

Kern's  eyes,  wider  than  ever,  shot  back  to  the  lady's  face.  A 

388 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


new  wonder  here!  —  Miss  Heth  said  it  just  like  in  the  Dream: 
Co-rinne. 

"Yes,  ma'am,"  said  Co-rinne,  with  a  little  gulp  and  a 
sniff. 

"And  what  are  you  doing  at  the  Men's  Furnishing  counter, 
Corinne?"  said  Carlisle,  pleasantly  but  quite  at  random.  "Buy 
ing  a  present  for  Mr.  V.  V.,  I  suppose?" 

"Yes,  ma'am." 

Having  taken  Carlisle  completely  aback,  she  hesitated  and 
then  added  timidly: 

"Only  a  fulldress-shirt  protector  —  for  his  birthday,  y'  know? 
.  .  .  All  his  sick  give  him  little  presents  now'n  then,  ma'am, 
find  out  his  sizes  and  all.  You  know  how  he  is,  spending  all  his 
money  on  them,  and  never  thinking  about  himself,  and  giving 
away  the  clo'es  off  his  back." 

"Yes,  I  know.  .  .  .  Find  out  his  sizes?" 

"Yes,  ma'am.  Like,  say,  'Why,  Mr.  —  why,  Dr.  Vivian,  what 
small  feet  you  got,  sir,  for  a  gempman ! '  And  he  '11  say,  like,  '  I 
don't  call  six  and  a  half  C  so  small !'  Yes,  ma'am  —  just  as  inno 
cent." 

A  block  and  a  half  away,  Hugo  Canning's  car  whirled  to  a 
standstill,  and  Hugo  sat  gazing  at  the  select  door  of  Morland's. 
In  Baird  &  Himmel's  vast  commonwealth,  Kern  Garland  sat 
beside  Miss  Carlisle  Heth  at  Gentlemen's  Furnishings,  and  could 
not  look  at  the  lady's  lovely  clothes  since  her  eyes  could  not  bear 
to  leave  the  yet  lovelier  face.  Kern  had  not  confided  the  secret 
of  the  protector  without  a  turning  of  her  heart,  but  now  at  least 
the  thrill  in  her  rose  above  that.  .  .  .  She  and  Mr.  V.  V.'s  beauti 
ful  lady,  side  by  side.  ...  It  was  nearly  as  good  as  the  velvet 
settee  in  the  Dream  —  only  for  the  founting,  and  the  boy  with 
the  pink  lamp  on  his  head,  and  Mr.  V.  V.  ... 

An  extremely  full-busted  Saleslady,  with  snapping  black  eyes, 
deposited  a  lean  bundle  and  a  ten-cent  piece  before  the  work-girl, 
oddly  murmured  something  that  sounded  like  '  Look  who 's  ear  *' 
and  then  said  proudly  to  Carlisle: 

"What  did  you  wish 'm?" 

"Nothing  just  now,  thank  you." 

389 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

The  Saleslady  gave  her  a  glance  of  intense  disapproval,  pushed 
down  her  generous  waist-line,  arrogantly  patted  a  coal-black 
transformation,  and  wheeled  with  open  indignation. 

"That's  nice,"  said  Carlisle,  to  the  factory-girl.  "Then  the 
presents  come  as  a  surprise  to  him." 

"  Surprise  —  no,  ma'am.  He  don't  never  know.  Take  the  tags 
off  'n  'em,  and  slip  'em  in  his  drawer,  and  he'll  put  'em  on  and 
never  notice  nor  suspicion,  shirts  and  such.  It 's  like  he  thought 
raiment  was  brought  him  by  the  crows,  —  like  in  the  Bible, 
ma'am,  y'  know?  " 

There  was  a  brief  silence.  Carlisle's  sheltered  life  had  not  too 
often  touched  the  simple  annals  of  the  poor.  She  seemed  to  get 
a  picture.  .  .  . 

The  little  work-girl's  face  was  not  coarse,  strangely  enough,  or 
even  common-looking;  it  was  pleasing  in  an  odd,  elfin  way.  Her 
white  dress  and  black  jacket  were  in  good  taste  for  her  station, 
without  vulgarity.  Such  details  Carlisle's  feminine  eye  soon 
gathered  in.  The  touch  she  missed  was  that  that  cheap  dress  was 
an  exact  copy  of  one  she  herself  had  worn  one  Sunday  afternoon 
in  May,  as  near  as  Kern  Garland  could  remember  it. 

"How  long  were  you  at  the  Works?"  said  the  lady  suddenly. 

"At  the  Works?  More  'n  three  years,  ma'am." 

There  was  another  silence  amid  the  bustle  of  the  people's 
emporium. 

"Tell  me,"  said  Carlisle,  with  some  effort,  "do  you  —  did  you 
—  looking  at  it  from  a  worker's  point  of  view  —  find  it  such  a 
very  bad  place  to  work?" 

"  Oh,  no,  ma'am ! "  said  Kern.  "Bad — oh,  no !  It 's  —  it 's  fine ! " 

Carlisle's  gaze  became  wider  than  the  little  girl's  own.  "  But  — 
Mr.  V.  V.  says  it's  a  terrible  place.  .  .  ." 

"It's  only  the  beautiful  way  he  talks,"  said  Kern,  eagerly. 
"I  mean,  he's  so,  so  sorry  for  the  poor.  .  .  .  But  lor,  ma'am,  we 
know  how  rich  is  rich,  and  poor  poor,  and  so  it  must  always  be 
this  side  o'  the  pearly  gates  — " 

She  stopped  short;  and  then  added  shyly,  with  a  kind  of  anx- 
iousness  in  her  wide  dark  gaze:  "An  expression,  ma'am  —  for 
Heaven.a_  I  — I  just  learned  it." 

390 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

The  lady's  look  was  absent.  "Oh! ...  Where  did  you  learn 
that?" 

"Off  Sadie  Whirtle,  ma'am  — a  friend  of  mine."  The  girl 
hesitated,  and  then  said:  "That's  her  now." 

And  she  pointed  a  small  finger  at  the  enormous  snapping 
Saleslady,  who  stood  glowering  and  patting  her  transformation 
at  another  customer  ten  feet  away. 

But  Carlisle  did  not  follow  the  finger,  and  so  missed  the  sight 
of  Miss  Whirtle.  Her  rising  relief  had  been  penetrated  by  a  doubt, 
not  a  new  one.  .  .  .  Would  her  friend  Vivian  have  committed 
himself  to  the  articles  for  only  a  foolish  sentimentalism  which  the 
poor  themselves  repudiated?  .  .  . 

"But  tell  me  frankly,  Corinne,  for  I  want  to  know,"  said  she  — 
"I  know  working  must  be  hard  in  any  case  —  but  do  the  girls  at 
the  Works  consider  it  a  —  a  reasonably  nice  place?" 

Kern  knew  nothing  of  the  articles,  of  any  situation:  and  at 
that  Co-rinne,  her  heart  ran  to  water  within  her.  She  would  have 
said  anything  for  that. 

"  Oh,  ma'am,  all  say  it 's  the  nicest  place  to  work  in  town.  Yes, 
ma'am.  .  .  .  And  some  of  'em  has  rich  fathers  and  need  n't  work 
at  all  anywhere,  but  they  just  go  on  and  work  at  the  Works,  yes, 
ma'am,  because  they  druther.  .  .  ." 

That,  by  a  little,  drew  the  long-bow  too  hard.  Cally  saw  that 
the  small  three-years'  buncher,  through  politeness  or  otherwise, 
was  speaking  without  reference  to  the  truth.  And  hard  upon  that 
she  had  another  thought,  striking  down  the  impulse  to  cross- 
examine  further.  What  an  undignified,  what  a  cowardly  way, 
to  try  to  find  things  out!  What  a  baby  she  was,  to  be  sure!  .  .  . 
V.  Vivian  knew  about  the  Works,  though  it  was  certainly  no  af 
fair  of  his.  This  frail  girl,  who  did  look  rather  sick  now  that 
you  stopped  and  looked  at  her,  knew  all  about  it.  Only  she,  her 
father's  daughter,  knew  nothing,  wrapped  in  her  layers  of  pretty 
pink  wool.  .  .  . 

The  lady  came  abruptly  to  her  feet. 

"I'm  glad  to  hear  it,"  said  she.  .  .  .  "But  I'm  afraid  I  must  go 
on  now.  Some  one  is  waiting  for  me  outside." 

"Oh!  — yes,  ma'am!" 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

Kern  had  risen  with  her,  though  she  had  not  learned  that  from 
the  Netiquette.  Much  it  would  have  amazed  her  to  know  that  the 
heavenly  visitor  was  regarding  her  with  a  flickering  conviction  of 
inferiority.  .  .  . 

"Good-bye,  then.  I  hope  you'll  soon  get  your  strength  back 
again.  .  .  .  And  I'm  very  glad  I  saw  you." 

And  then  there  was  her  hand  held  out;  not  lady  to  lady,  of 
course,  but  still  her  lady's  hand.  Poor  Kern,  with  her  exaltation 
and  her  pangs,  felt  ready  to  go  down  on  one  knee  to  take  it. 

"Oh,  ma'am!"  she  stammered.   "I'm  the  glad  one  .  .  ." 

Miss  Heth  smiled  —  oh,  so  sweet,  almost  like  in  the  Dream  — 
and  then  it  was  all  over,  and  she  was  walking  away,  with  the 
loveliest  rustle  ever  was.  And  Kern  stood  lost  in  the  thronging 
aisle,  staring  at  the  point  where  she  had  disappeared  and  giving 
little  pinches  to  her  thin  arm  —  just  to  make  certain-sure, 
y'  know  .  .  . 

This  till  the  voice  of  Miss  Whirtle  spoke  in  her  ear: 

" Say,  Kurrin,  I  like  that!  Why  n't  you  ask  me  to  shake  hands 
with  your  swell  dame  friend?" 

And  Miss  Heth,  out  in  the  crowded  street,  was  heading 
toward  Morland's  with  an  adventurous  resolution  in  her  mind. 

It  had  needed  but  a  touch  to  make  up  her  mind  here,  whether 
she  realized  it  or  not;  and  this  touch  the  girl  Corinne  had  given 
her.  Now,  too,  impulse  met  convenient  opportunity.  For  two 
weeks  she  had  been  thinking  that  if  she  did  ever  happen  to  go  to 
the  Works,  she  would  make  a  point  of  going  in  some  offhand,  in 
cidental  sort  of  way,  thus  proving  to  herself  and  the  public  that 
she  had  not  the  slightest  responsibility  for  whatever  might  be  go 
ing  on  there.  (How  could  she  possibly  have,  no  matter  what  Mr. 
V.  V.  thought,  with  his  exaggerated  sympathies  for  the  poor?) 
Now  here  was  Hugo  waiting,  perfectly  fitted  to  her  need.  What 
could  be  more  natural  and  incidental  than  this?  She  would  simply 
be  showing  her  father's  factory  to  her  friend,  Mr.  Canning.  .  .  . 

And  perhaps  Cally  had  an  even  deeper  feeling  of  Mr.  Can 
ning's  admirable  suitability  in  this  connection.  Somewhere  just 
above  the  line  of  consciousness,  did  there  not  lie  the  subtle 
thought  that,  if  what  she  saw  at  the  Works  should  have  power  to 

392 


V.    V.'s    Eyes 

work  dangerously  on  her  own  sympathies,  Hugo,  with  his  strong 
worldly  sense,  his  material  perfection,  his  whole  splendid  em 
bodiment  of  the  victorious-class  ideal,  would  be  just  the  correc 
tive  she  needed  to  keep  her  safe  and  sane?  .  .  . 

When  she  was  seated  in  the  car  beside  him,  and  he  was  tuck 
ing  the  robe  around  her,  Cally  inquired  with  a  deceptive  air  of 
indifference: 

"You  don't  care  particularly  where  we  go,  do  you,  Hugo?" 

"The  point  seems  of  no  importance  whatever,  now  that  I've 
got  you." 

"Then,"  said  she,  smiling,  "I  shall  take  you  first  to  the  Heth 
Cheroot  Works." 

Canning's  face,  which  had  been  buoyant  from  the  moment  his 
eyes  discovered  her  in  the  crowd,  betrayed  surprise  and  strong 
disapproval.  That,  surely,  would  give  his  afternoon  a  slant  dif 
ferent  from  his  plannings.  .  .  . 

"I  bar  the  Works.  I  feel  all  ways  but  sociological  to-day. 
Let's  go  to  the  country." 

"Afterwards,"  said  she,  with  the  same  lightness,  clear  proof  of 
the  casual  nature  of  the  proposed  excursion.  "  We'll  simply  pop 
in  for  a  minute  or  two,  to  see  what  it  looks  like  — " 

"But  you  can't  tell  what  it  looks  like,  even  — " 

"Well,  at  least  I'll  have  seen  it.  Do  give  me  my  way  about 
this.  You'll  enjoy  it  .  .  ." 

And  leaning  forward  on  that,  she  said  to  his  hired  driver: 
"Take  us  to  Seventeenth  and  Canal  Streets." 

The  shadow  of  disapprobation  did  not  lift  from  Hugo's  face. 

"  I  had  no  idea,"  he  said,  boredly  and  somewhat  stiffly,  "that 
you  took  your  new-thought  so  seriously." 

Cally  laughed  brightly.  "But  then  you  never  think  women 
are  serious,  Hugo." 

It  was  on  the  tip  of  her  tongue  to  add:  "Until  it's  too  late." 
But  she  held  that  back,  as  being  too  pointedly  reminiscent. 


XXVIII 

A  Little  Visit  to  the  Birthplace  of  the  Family;  how  Colly  thinks 
Socialism  and  almost  faints,  and  Hugo's  Afternoon  of  Romance 
ends  Short  in  the  Middle. 

THE  car  came  to  a  standstill,  and  Cally  was  reminded  of 
another  afternoon,  long  ago,  when  she  and  Hen  Cooney 
had  encountered  Mr.  V.  V.  upon  this  humming  corner. 
This  time,  she  knew  which  way  to  look. 

"There  it  is.  ...  Confess,  Hugo,  you're  surprised  that  it's  so 
small!" 

But  Hugo  helped  no  new-thoughter  to  belittle  honest  business. 

" Unlike  some  I  could  mention,  I've  seen  factories  before," 
quoth  he.  "I've  seen  a  million  dollar  business  done  in  a  smaller 
plant  than  that." 

Actually  Cally  found  the  Works  bigger  than  she  had  ex 
pected;  reaction  from  the  childish  marble  palace  idea  had  swung 
her  mind's  eye  too  far.  But  gazing  at  the  weatherworn  old  pile, 
spilling  dirtily  over  the  broken  sidewalk,  she  was  once  more  struck 
and  depressed  by  something  almost  sinister  about  it,  something 
vaguely  foreboding.  To  her  imagination  it  was  a  little  as  if 
the  ramshackle  old  pile  leered  at  her:  "Wash  your  hands  of  me 
if  you  will,  young  lady.  I  mean  you  harm  some  day.  ..." 

But  then,  of  course,  she  was  n't  washing  her  hands  of  it;  her 
hands  had  never  been  in  it  at  all. 

"You'll  get  intensely  interested  and  want  to  stay  hours!"  said 
she,  with  the  loud  roar  of  traffic  in  her  ears.  "Remember  I  only 
came  for  a  peep  —  just  to  see  what  a  Works  is  like  inside." 

Hugo,  guiding  her  over  the  littered  sidewalk  to  the  shabby 
little  door  marked  "Office,"  swore  that  she  could  not  make  her 
peep  too  brief  for  him. 

She  had  considered  the  possibility  of  encountering  her  father 
here;  had  seen  the  difficulties  of  attributing  this  foray  to  Hugo's 

394 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


insatiable  interest  in  commerce,  with  Hugo  standing  right  there. 
However,  in  the  very  unpretentious  offices  inside  —  desolate 
places  of  common  wood  partitions,  bare  floors,  and  strange,  tall 
stools  and  desks  —  she  was  assured  by  an  anaemic  youth  with  a 
red  Adam's  apple  that  her  father  had  left  for  the  bank  an  hour 
earlier,  which  was  according  to  his  usual  habit.  She  inquired  for 
Chas  Cooney,  who  kept  books  from  one  of  those  lofty  stools,  but 
Chas  was  reported  sick  in  bed,  as  Cally  then  remembered  that 
Hen  had  told  her,  some  days  since.  Accordingly  the  visitors  fell 
into  the  hands  of  Mr.  MacQueen,  whom  Carlisle,  in  the  years, 
had  seen  occasionally  entering  or  leaving  papa's  study  o'  nights. 

MacQueen  was  black,  bullet-headed,  and  dour.  He  had  held 
socialistic  views  in  his  fiery  youth,  but  had  changed  his  mind  like 
the  rest  of  us  when  he  found  himself  rising  in  the  world.  In  these 
days  he  received  a  percentage  on  the  Works  profits,  and  cursed 
the  impudence  of  Labor.  As  to  visitors,  his  politics  were  that  all 
such  had  better  be  at  their  several  homes,  and  he  indicated  these 
opinions,  with  no  particular  subtlety,  to  Miss  Heth  and  Mr. 
Canning.  He  even  cited  them  a  special  reason  against  visiting 
to-day:  new  machines  being  installed,  and  the  shop  upset  in  con 
sequence.  However,  he  did  not  feel  free  to  refuse  the  request  out 
right,  and  when  Canning  grew  a  little  sharp,  —  for  he  did  the 
talking,  generously  enough,  —  the  sour  vizier  yielded,  though 
with  no  affectation  of  a  good  grace. 

"Well,  as  ye  like  then.  .  .  .  This  way." 

And  he  opened  a  door  with  a  briskness  which  indicated  that 
Carlisle's  expressed  wish  "just  to  look  around"  should  be  car 
ried  out  in  the  most  literal  manner.  . 

The  opening  of  this  door  brought  a  surprise.  Things  were  so 
unceremonious  in  the  business  district,  it  seemed,  that  you 
stepped  from  the  superintendent's  office  right  into  the  middle 
of  everything,  so  to  speak.  You  were  inspecting  your  father's 
business  a  minute  before  you  knew  it.  ... 

Cally,  of  course,  had  had  not  the  faintest  idea  what  to  expect 
at  the  Works.  She  had  prepared  herself  to  view  horrors  with 
calm  and  detachment,  if  such  proved  to  be  the  iron  law  of  bus 
iness.  But,  gazing  confusedly  at  the  dim,  novel  spectacle  that  so 

395 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

suddenly  confronted  her,  she  saw  nothing  of  the  kind.  Her  heart, 
which  had  been  beating  a  little  faster  than  usual,  rose  at  once. 

Technically  speaking,  which  was  the  way  Mr.  MacQueen 
spoke,  this  was  the  receiving-  and  stemming-room.  It  was  as  big 
as  a  barn,  the  full  size  of  the  building,  except  for  the  end  cut  off  to 
make  the  offices.  Negroes  worked  here;  negro  men,  mostly 
wearing  red  undershirts.  They  sat  in  long  rows,  with  quick 
fingers  stripping  the  stems  from  the  not  unfragrant  leaves. 
These  were  stemmers,  it  was  learned.  Piles  of  the  brown  tobacco 
stood  beside  each  stemmer,  bales  of  it  were  stacked,  ceiling-high, 
at  the  farther  end  of  the  room,  awaiting  their  attentions.  The 
negroes  eyed  the  visitors  respectfully.  They  were  heard  to 
laugh  and  joke  over  their  labors.  If  they  knew  of  anything 
homicidal  in  their  lot,  certainly  they  bore  it  with  a  fine  humor 
ous  courage. 

Down  the  aisle  between  the  black  rows,  Cally  picked  her  way 
after  Hugo  and  Mr.  MacQueen.  Considering  that  all  this  was 
her  father's,  she  felt  abashingly  out  of  place,  most  intrusive; 
when  she  caught  a  dusky  face  turned  upon  her  she  hastily  looked 
another  way.  Still,  she  felt  within  her  an  increasing  sense  of  cheer 
fulness.  Washington  Street  sensibilities  were  offended,  naturally. 
The  busy  colored  stemmers  were  scarcely  inviting  to  the  eye;  the 
odor  of  the  tobacco  soon  grew  a  little  overpowering;  there  were 
dirt  and  dust  and  an  excess  of  steam-heat  —  "Tobacco  likes  to  be 
warm,"  said  MacQueen.  And  yet  the  dainty  visitor's  chief  im 
pression,  somehow,  was  of  system  and  usefulness  and  order,  of 
efficient  and  on  the  whole  well-managed  enterprise. 

"If  there's  anything  the  matter  here,"  thought  she,  "men  will 
have  to  quarrel  and  decide  about  it  ...  Just  as  I  said." 

The  inspecting  party  went  upward,  and  these  heartening 
impressions  were  strengthened.  On  the  second  floor  was  another 
stemming-room,  long  and  hot  like  the  other;  only  here  the  stem 
ming  was  done  by  machines  —  "for  the  fancy  goods"  —  and  the 
machines  were  operated  by  negro  women.  They  were  middle- 
aged  women,  many  of  them,  industrious  and  quite  placid- 
looking.  Perhaps  a  quarter  of  the  whole  length  of  the  room  was 
prosaically  filled  with  piled  tobacco  stored  ready  for  the  two 

396 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

floors  of  stemmers.  The  inspection  here  was  brief,  and  to  tell  the 
truth,  rather  tame,  like  an  anti-climax.  Not  a  trace  or  a  vestige 
of  homicide  was  descried,  not  a  blood-spot  high  or  low.  .  .  . 

Cally  had  been  observing  Hugo,  who  looked  so  resplendent 
against  this  workaday  background,  and  felt  herself  at  a  disad 
vantage  with  him.  He  had  not  wanted  to  come  at  all,  but  now 
that  they  were  here,  he  exhibited  a  far  more  intelligent  interest  in 
what  he  saw  than  she  did  or  could.  Oddly  enough,  he  appeared 
to  know  a  good  deal  about  the  making  of  cigars,  and  his  pointed 
comments  gradually  elicited  a  new  tone  from  MacQueen,  who 
was  by  now  talking  to  him  almost  as  to  an  equal.  Several  times 
Cally  detected  his  eyes  upon  her,  not  bored  but  openly  quizzical. 

" Learning  exactly  how  a  cheroot  factory  ought  to  be  run?"  he 
asked,  sotto  wee,  as  they  left  the  second  floor. 

"Oh,  exactly!  .  .  .  For  one  thing,  I'd  recommend  a  ventilator 
or  two,  should  n't  you?" 

She  felt  just  a  little  foolish.  She  also  felt  out  of  her  element, 
incidental,  irresponsible,  and  genuinely  relieved.  Still,  through 
this  jumble  of  feelings  she  had  not  forgotten  that  they  were  yet  to 
see  that  part  of  the  Works  which  she  had  specially  come  to  peep 
at 

Progress  upward  was  by  means  of  a  most  primitive  elevator, 
nothing  but  an  open  platform  of  bare  boards,  which  Mr.  Mac- 
Queen  worked  with  one  hand,  and  which  interestingly  pushed  up 
the  floor  above  as  one  ascended.  As  they  rose  by  this  quaint  de 
vice,  Carlisle  said: 

"Is  this  next  the  bunching-room,  Mr.  MacQueen?" 

"It  is,  Miss." 

"Bunching-room!"  echoed  Hugo,  with  satiric  admiration. 
"You  are  an  expert.  ..." 

The  lift-shaft  ran  in  one  corner  of  the  long  building.  Debark 
ing  on  the  third  floor,  the  visitors  had  to  step  around  a  tall,  shin 
ing  machine,  not  to  mention  two  workmen  who  had  evidently 
just  landed  it.  Several  other  machines  stood  loosely  grouped 
here,  all  obviously  new  and  not  yet  in  place. 

Hugo,  pointing  with  his  stick,  observed:  "Clearing  in  new 
floor-space,  I  see." 

397 


V. 


V.  's 


Eyes 


MacQueen  nodded.  "Knocked  out  a  cloak-room.  Our  fight 
here's  for  space.  Profits  get  smaller  all  the  time.  .  .  ." 

"  H'm.  .  .  .  You  figured  the  strain,  I  suppose.  Your  floor  looks 
weak." 

"Oh,  it'll  stand  it,"  said  the  man,  shortly.   "This  way." 

Carlisle  wondered  if  the  weak  floor  was  what  her  friend  Vivian 
had  meant  when  he  said,  in  his  extreme  way,  that  the  Works 
might  fall  down  some  day.  She  recalled  that  she  had  thought 
the  building  looked  rather  ricketty,  that  day  last  year.  But  these 
thoughts  hardly  entered  her  mind  before  the  sight  of  her  eyes 
knocked  them  out.  The  visitors  squeezed  around  the  new 
machines,  and,  doing  so,  stepped  full  into  the  bunching-room. 
And  the  girl  saw  in  one  glance  that  this  was  the  strangest,  the 
most  interesting  room  she  had  ever  seen  in  her  life. 

Her  first  confused  sense  was  only  of  an  astonishing  mass  of 
dirty  white  womanhood.  The  thick  hot  room  seemed  swarming 
with  women,  alive  and  teeming  with  women,  women  tumbling  all 
over  each  other  wherever  the  eye  turned.  Tall  clacking  machines 
ran  closely  around  the  walls  of  the  room,  down  the  middle  stood  a 
double  row  of  tables;  and  at  each  machine,  and  at  every  possible 
place  at  the  tables,  sat  a  woman  crowded  upon  a  woman,  and 
another  and  another. 

Dirt,  noise,  heat,  and  smell:  women,  women,  women.  Con 
glomeration  of  human  and  inhuman  such  as  the  eyes  of  the  re 
fined  seldom  look  upon.  .  .  .  Was  this,  indeed,  the  pleasantest 
place  to  work  in  town?  .  .  . 

"Bunchin'  and  wrappin',"  said  MacQueen.  "Filler's  fed  in 
from  that  basin  on  top.  She  slips  in  the  binder  —  machine  rolls 
'em  together.  ...  Ye  can  see  here." 

They  halted  by  one  of  the  bunching-machines,  and  saw  the 
parts  dexterously  brought  together  into  the  crude  semblance  of 
the  product,  saw  the  embryo  cigars  thrust  into  wooden  forms 
which  would  shape  them  yet  further  for  their  uses  in  a  world 
asmoke.  .  .  . 

"Jove!  Watch  how  her  hands  fly!"  said  Hugo,  with  manlike 
interest  for  processes,  things  done.  "Look,  Carlisle." 

Carlisle  looked  dutifully.  It  was  in  the  order  of  things  that  she 

398 


V-    V.  's     Eyes 

should  bring  Hugo  to  the  Works,  and  that,  being  here,  he  should 
take  charge  of  her.  But,  unconsciously,  she  soon  turned  her  back 
to  the  busy  machine,  impelled  by  the  mounting  interest  she  felt  to 
see  bunching,  not  in  detail,  but  in  the  large. 

Downstairs  the  workers  had  been  negroes;  here  they  were 
white  women,  a  different  matter.  But  Cally  had  a  closer  associa 
tion  than  that,  in  the  girl  she  had  just  been  talking  to,  Corinne, 
who  had  worked  three  years  in  this  room.  It  was  n't  so  easy  to 
preserve  the  valuable  detached  point  of  view,  when  you  actually 
knew  one  of  the  people.  .  .  . 

"Three  cents  a  hundred,"  said  MacQueen's  rugged  voice. 

There  was  a  fine  brown  dust  in  the  air  of  the  teeming  room,  and 
the  sickening  smell  of  new  tobacco.  Not  a  window  in  the  place 
was  open,  and  the  strong  steam  heat  seemed  almost  over 
whelming.  The  women  had  now  been  at  it  for  near  nine 
hours.  Damp,  streaked  faces,  for  the  most  part  pale  and  some 
what  heavy,  turned  incessantly  toward  the  large  wall-clock  at 
one  end  of  the  room.  Eyes  looked  sidewise  upon  the  elegant 
visitors,  but  then  the  flying  fingers  were  off  again,  for  time  is 
strictly  money  with  piecework.  .  .  .  How  could  they  stand  being 
so  crowded,  and  could  n't  they  have  any  air  ? 

"Oh,  five  thousand  a  day  —  plenty  of  them." 

"Five  thousand!  —  how  do  they  do  it?" 

"We  had  a  girl  do  sixty-five  hundred.  She's  quit.  .  .  .  Here's 
one  down  here  ain't  bad." 

The  trio  moved  down  the  line  of  machines,  past  soiled,  busy 
backs.  Close  on  their  left  was  the  double  row  of  tables,  where  the 
hurrying  "  wrappers  "  sat  like  sardines.  Cally  now  saw  that  these 
were  not  women  at  all,  but  young  girls,  like  Corinne;  girls  mostly 
younger  than  she  herself,  some  very  much  younger.  Only  they 
seemed  to  be  girls  with  a  difference,  girls  who  had  somehow  lost 
their  girlhood.  The  rather  nauseating  atmosphere  which  en 
veloped  them,  the  way  they  were  huddled  together  yet  never 
ceased  to  drive  on  their  tasks,  the  slatternly  uncorseted  figures, 
stolid  faces  and  furtive  glances;  by  something  indefinable  in  their 
situation,  these  girls  seemed  to  have  been  degraded  and  dehu 
manized,  to  have  lost  something  more  precious  than  virtue. 

399 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Yet  some  of  them  were  quite  pretty,  beneath  dust  and  fa- 
tigue;  one,  with  a  quantity  of  crinkly  auburn  hair,  was  very 
pretty,  indeed.  The  girl  Corinne,  after  three  years  here,  was 
both  pretty  and  possessed  of  a  certain  delicacy;  a  delicacy 
which  forbade  her  to  tell  Mr.  Heth's  daughter  what  she  really 
thought  about  the  Works.  For  that  must  have  been  it  ... 

"This  'un  can  keep  three  wrappers  pretty  busy  when  she's 
feelin'  good.  Can't  yer,  Miller?  ...  Ye  '11  see  the  wrappers  there, 
in  a  minute." 

This  'un,  or  Miller,  was  a  tall,  gaunt,  sallow  girl,  who  handled 
her  machine  with  the  touch  of  a  master,  eliminating  every  super 
fluous  move  and  filling  a  form  of  a  dozen  rough  cheroots  quickly 
enough  to  take  a  visitor's  breath  away.  No  doubt  it  was  very  in 
structive  to  see  how  fast  cheroots  could  be  made.  However,  the 
stirring  interest  of  the  daughter  of  the  Works  was  not  for  me 
chanical-  skill. 

Cally  stood  with  a  daintily  scented  handkerchief  at  her  nos 
trils,  painfully  drinking  in  the  origins  of  the  Heth  fortune.  The 
safeguarding  sense  of  irresponsibility  ebbed,  do  what  she  might. 
Well  she  knew  that  this  place  could  not  be  so  bad  as  it  seemed  to 
her;  for  then  her  father  would  not  have  let  it  be  so.  For  her  to 
seem  to  disapprove  of  papa's  business  methods  was  mere  silly 
impertinence,  on  top  of  the  disloyalty  of  it.  But  none  of  the  sane 
precepts  she  had  had  two  weeks  to  think  out  seemed  to  make 
any  answer  to  the  disturbing  sensations  she  felt  rising,  like  a  sick 
ness,  within  her.  ... 

Her  sense  was  of  something  polluting  at  the  spring  of  her  life. 
Here  was  the  soil  that  she  was  rooted  in,  and  the  soil  was  not 
clean.  It  might  be  business,  it  might  be  right;  but  no  argument 
could  make  it  agreeable  to  feel  that  the  money  she  wore  upon  her 
back  at  this  moment  was  made  in  this  malodorous  place,  by 
these  thickly  crowded  girls.  .  .  .  Was  it  in  such  thoughts  that 
grew  this  sense  of  some  personal  relation  of  herself  with  her 
father's  most  unpleasant  bunching-room?  Was  it  for  such  rea 
sons  that  V.  Vivian  had  asked  her  that  day  at  the  Settlement  why 
did  n't  she  go  to  the  Works  some  day?  .  .  . 

She  heard  Hugo's  voice,  with  a  note  of  admiration  for  visi- 

400 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


ble  efficiency:  "How  do  they  keep  it  up  at  this  clip  nine 
hours?" 

"Got  to  do  it,  or  others  will." 

"You  expect  each  machine  to  produce  so  much,  I  suppose?" 

And  Cally,  so  close  to  her  lordly  lover  that  her  arm  brushed 
his,  was  seeing  for  the  first  time  in  her  life  what  people  meant 
when  they  threw  bricks  at  papa  on  election  night,  or  felt  the 
strong  necessity  of  attacking  him  in  the  papers.  By  processes 
that  were  less  mental  than  emotional,  even  physical,  she  was 
driven  further  down  a  well-trod  path  and  stood  dimly  confront 
ing  the  outlines  of  a  vast  interrogation.  .  .  .  What  particular  hu 
man  worth  had  she,  Cally  Heth,  that  the  womanhood  of  these 
lower-class  sisters  should  be  sapped  that  she  might  wear  silk  next 
her  skin,  and  be  bred  to  appeal  to  the  highly  cultivated  tastes  of  a 
Canning?  .  .  . 

If  there  are  experiences  which  permanently  extend  the  fron 
tiers  of  thought,  it  was  not  in  this  girl's  power  to  recognize  one 
of  them  closing  down  on  her  now.  But  she  did  perceive,  by  the 
growing  commotion  within,  that  she  had  made  a  great  mistake 
to  come  to  this  place.  .  .  . 

"Now,  here's  wrapping,"  said  MacQueen.  "Hand  work,  you 
see." 

But  his  employer's  daughter,  it  appeared,  had  seen  enough  of 
cigar-making  for  one  day.  At  that  moment  she  touched  Can 
ning's  well-tailored  arm. 

"Let's  go.  ...  It's  —  stifling  here." 

Hugo,  just  turning  from  the  bunching-machine,  regarded  her 
faintly  horrified  face  with  some  amusement.  And  Carlisle  saw 
that  he  was  amused. 

"I  was  wondering,"  said  he,  "how  long  your  sociology  would 
survive  this  air.  .  .  ." 

The  peep  was  meant  to  end  there,  and  should  have  done  so. 
But  unluckily,  at  just  that  juncture,  there  came  a  small  diver 
sion.  The  gaunt  girl  Miller,  by  whose  machine  the  little  party 
stood,  took  it  into  her  head  to  keep  at  it  no  longer. 

Though  nobody  had  noticed  it,  this  girl  had  been  in  trouble 
for  the  last  five  minutes.  The  presence  of  the  visitors,  or  of  the 

401 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

superintendent,  had  evidently  made  her  nervous;  she  kept  look 
ing  half -around  out  of  the  darting  corners  of  her  eyes.  Three 
times,  as  the  men  watched  and  talked  about  her,  she  had  raised  a 
hand  in  the  heat  and  brushed  it  hurriedly  before  her  eyes.  And 
then,  just  as  the  superintendent  turned  from  her  and  all  would 
have  been  well  again,  her  overdrawn  nerve  gave  out.  The  hands 
became  suddenly  limp  on  the  machine  they  knew  so  well;  they 
slid  backward,  at  first  slowly  and  then  with  the  speed  of  a  fall 
ing  body;  and  poor  Miller  slipped  quietly  from  her  stool  to  the 
floor,  her  head  actually  brushing  the  lady's  skirt  as  she  fell. 

Cally  stifled  a  little  cry.  Hugo,  obvious  for  once,  said,  "Why, 
she's  fainted!"  —  in  an  incredulous  voice.  Considerably  better 
in  action  were  the  experienced  Works  people.  MacQueen  sprang 
for  a  water-bucket  with  a  celerity  which  strongly  suggested  prac 
tice.  A  stout,  unstayed  buncher  filled  a  long-felt  want  by  flinging 
open  a  window.  One  from  a  neighboring  machine  sat  on  the  floor, 
Miller's  head  on  her  lap.  Two  others  stood  by.  .  .  . 

Carlisle,  holding  to  the  silenced  machine  with  a  small  gloved 
hand,  gazed  down  as  at  a  bit  of  stage-play. 

They  had  formed  a  screen  about  the  fallen  girl,  under  Mac- 
Queen's  directions,  to  cut  her  off  from  the  general  view.  The 
superintendent's  gaze  swept  critically  about.  However,  the  sud 
den  confusion  had  drawn  the  attention  of  all  that  part  of  the 
room,  and  concealment  proved  a  too  optimistic  hope.  The  mo 
ment  happened  to  be  ripe  for  one  of  those  curious  panics  of  the 
imagination  to  which  crowded  womanhood  is  psychologically 
subject.  Knowledge  that  somebody  was  down  ran  round  the 
room  as  if  it  had  been  shouted;  and  on  the  knowledge,  fear  stalked 
among  the  tired  girls,  and  the  thing  itself  was  born  of  the  dread 
of  it. 

So  it  was  that  Carlisle,  gripping  fast  to  poor  Miller's  machine, 
heard  an  odd  noise  behind  her,  and  turned  with  a  sickening  drop 
ping  of  the  heart.  Five  yards  away  a  girl  gave  a  little  moan  and 
flopped  forward  upon  her  machine.  She  was  a  fine,  strapping 
young  creature,  and  it  is  certain  that  two  minutes  before  nothing 
had  been  further  from  her  mind  than  fainting.  It  did  not  stop 
there.  Far  up  the  room  a  "wrapper"  rose  in  the  dense  air,  took 

402 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


her  head  in  both  hands  and  fell  backward  into  the  arms  of  the 
operative  next  her.  In  the  extreme  corner  of  the  great  room  a 
little  stir  indicated  that  another  had  gone  down  there.  Work 
had  almost  ceased.  Many  eyes  stared  with  sudden  nervous  ap 
prehension  into  other  eyes,  as  if  to  say:  "Am  I  to  be  the 
next?  .  .  ." 

MacQueen's  voice  rang  out  —  a  fine  voice  it  was,  the  kind  that 
makes  people  sit  down  again  in  a  fire-scared  theatre: 

"  Take  your  seats,  every  one  of  you.  .  .  .  Nothing's  going  to  hap 
pen.  You  're  all  right,  I  say.  Go  on  with  your  work.  Sit  down. 
Get  to  work " 

"Air,"  said  Cally  Heth,  in  a  small  colorless  voice. 

Hugo  wheeled  sharply. 

"Great  heavens!  —  Carlisle!  .  .  .  Do  you  feel  faint?" 

He  had  her  at  the  open  window  in  a  trice,  clasping  her  arm 
tight,  speaking  masculine  encouragement.  .  .  .  "Hold  hard,  my 

dear !  .  .  .  I  should  have  watched  you.  .  .  .  Now,  breathe  this 

Gulp  it  in,  Cally.  .  .  ." 

His  beloved,  indeed,  like  the  work-sisters,  had  felt  the  brush  of 
the  black  wing.  For  an  instant  nothing  had  seemed  surer  than 
that  the  daughter  of  the  Works  would  be  the  fifth  girl  to  faint  in 
the  bunching-room  that  day;  she  had  seen  the  floor  rise  under  her 
whirling  vision.  .  .  . 

But  once  at  the  window  the  dark  minute  passed  speedily.  The 
keen  October  air  bore  the  gift  of  life.  Blood  trickled  back  into 
the  dead  white  cheeks. 

"I  ...  was  just  a  little  dizzy,"  said  Cally,  quite  apologeti 
cally  .  .  . 

And,  though  the  visitors  departed  then,  almost  immediately, 
all  signs  of  the  sudden  little  panic  in  the  bunching-room  were 
already  rapidly  disappearing.  Work  proceeded.  The  gaunt  girl 
Miller,  who  had  earned  MacQueen's  permanent  dislike  by  start 
ing  all  the  trouble,  was  observed  sitting  again  at  her  machine, 
hands  and  feet  reaching  out  for  the  accustomed  levers. 

It  made  an  amazing  difference  simply  to  be  outdoors  again. 
The  last  few  minutes  in  the  Works  had  been  like  a  waxing  night- 

403 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

mare.  But  the  sunshine  was  bright  and  sane;  the  raw  clean  winds 
blew  the  horrors  away.  Carlisle,  realizing  that  she  had  been  swept 
along  toward  something  like  hysterics,  struggled  with  some  suc 
cess  to  recapture  poise  and  common  sense. 

But  she  could  not  now  quite  strike  the  manner  of  one  who  has 
merely  paused  for  an  irresponsible  peep.  Hugo  was  aware  of  a 
change  in  her,  before  they  were  fairly  in  the  car  again.  He  had 
occasion  to  reflect  anew,  not  without  irritation,  what  an  unfortu 
nate  turn  she  had  given  to  the  afternoon  of  romance,  over  his  own 
plainly  expressed  wishes.  .  .  . 

Yet  nothing  could  have  exceeded  his  solicitousness.  He  seemed 
to  feel  that  he  had  been  neglectful  upstairs,  that  she  would  not 
have  felt  faint  if  he  had  properly  presided  over  her  movements. 
Cally  had  to  assure  him  half  a  dozen  times  in  as  many  blocks  that 
she  felt  quite  herself  again. 

And,  meantime,  he  conscientiously  gave  himself  to  relieving  her 
mind  of  the  effects  of  her  own  feminine  foolishness.  That  queer 
and  undoubtedly  upsetting  bit  of  "crowd  psychology"  they  had 
seen  —  that,  he  pointed  out,  had  come  merely  from  the  unusual 
heat,  the  control  of  the  steam-pipes  happening  to  be  out  of  whack 
to-day.  Such  a  thing  did  n't  happen  once  in  six  months;  so  that 
surly  fellow  MacQueen  had  said.  Of  course,  producing  wealth 
was  a  hard  business  at  best,  let  none  deny  it.  Everybody  would 
like  to  see  factories  run  on  the  model  theory,  like  health  resorts, 
but  the  truth  was  that  those  ideas  were  mostly  wind  and  water, 
and  had  never  worked  out  yet.  An  owner  must  think  of  his  profits 
first,  unfeeling  as  that  might  seem;  else  he  would  have  to  shut  up 
shop,  and  then  where  would  those  girls  be  for  a  living?  They 
need  n't  work  for  her  father  unless  they  wanted  to,  of  course.  .  .  . 

"You  should  look  into  a  cannery  some  day,  for  sights  —  by 
which  I  mean  that  you  should  n't  do  anything  of  the  sort !  .  .  . 
Oh,  get  us  to  some  quieter  street  there,  Frederick!  .  .  .  But  it  was 
my  fault  for  agreeing  to  go  with  you.  I  knew,  as  you  could  n't, 
that  a  going  factory 's  no  place  for  a  girl  delicately  brought  up. 
Those  women  don't  mind.  That  is,  as  a  rule  ..." 

Carlisle  responded  to  this  sensible  treatment  with  what  light- 
someness  she  could  muster;  but  the  odd  truth  was  that  she  hardly 

404 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


listened  to  Hugo.  Heaven  knew  that  she  needed  the  strong  sane 
arguments,  heaven  knew  that  he  could  state  them  all  unanswer 
ably.  And  yet,  just  as  she  was  aware  that  her  woman's  feelings 
about  the  bunching-room  would  have  no  weight  with  Hugo,  so 
she  was  curiously  aware  that  Hugo's  arguments  produced  no 
effect  at  all  upon  her.  If  she  had  relied  upon  him  as  a  demolish 
ing  club  against  Vivian,  the  over-sympathetic,  it  appeared  that 
his  strength  was  not  equal  to  the  peculiar  demand.  And  all  at 
once  she  seemed  to  have  gotten  to  know  her  lover  very  well; 
there  were  no  more  surprises  in  him.  She  suddenly  perceived  a 
strange  and  hitherto  unsuspected  likeness  between  Hugo  and 
mamma,  in  that  you  could  not  talk  over  things  with  either  of 
them.  .  .  . 

"Remember,  Cally,"  he  said,  summing  up,  "this  is  the  first 
factory  you  've  ever  seen  in  your  life.  You ' ve  nothing  at  all  to 
judge  by,  in  a  business  matter  of  this  sort  — " 

Something  in  his  tone  flicked  her  briefly  out  of  her  resolve  not 
to  argue;  but  she  spoke  lightly  enough. 

"Yes,  I  judge  by  the  way  it  made  me  feel.  I  judge  everything 
that  way." 

"That's  natural,  of  course,"  said  he,  with  a  slight  smile,  "but 
after  all  it 's  rather  a  woman 's  way  of  judging  things  than  a  socio 
logist's.  Is  n't  it?" 

"But  I  am  a  woman." 

The  car  shook  off  the  dust  of  the  business  district,  mounted  a 
long  hill,  bowled  into  streets  fairer  than  Canal.  Hugo's  sense  of  a 
grievance  deepened.  Granted  that  she  had  nearly  fainted,  as  a 
consequence  of  her  own  foolish  perversity,  it  was  surely  now  due 
to  him  that  she  should  begin  to  be  her  sweet  natural  self  again. 

He  had  had  quite  enough  of  this  irrational  invasion  of  his  after 
noon;  and  so,  having  said  just  a  word  or  two  in  reply  to  her  last 
remark,  he  banished  the  matter  from  the  conversation. 

"  Now,"  said  he,  "  to  fresh  woods  and  pastures  new,  and  a  song 
of  the  open  road!  .  .  .  Which  way  shall  we  go?" 

Cally  hesitated. 

"I'm  sorry,  Hugo  —  but  I  think  I  should  like  to  go  home,  if 
you  don't  mind." 

405 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Home?" 

"I  really  don't  feel  quite  like  a  drive  now.  I 'm  very  sorry  —  " 

Canning  gazed  down  at  her  in  dismay. 

"I  knew  you  did  n't  feel  quite  yourself  yet.  You  could  n't  de 
ceive  me  .  .  .  But  don't  let's  go  home  1  Why,  this  air  is  the  very 
thing  you  need,  Carlisle.  It  will  set  you  up  in  no  time." 

But  no,  she  seemed  to  think  that  was  not  what  she  needed,  nor 
were  her  doubts  removed  by  several  further  arguments  from  him. 

Canning  sat  back  in  the  car  with  an  Early  Christian  expres 
sion.  She  had  said,  not  five  minutes  ago,  that  she  felt  perfectly 
well;  perfectly  well  she  looked.  Was  it  imaginable  that  she  really 
took  seriously  the  absurd  little  smatterings  of  new-womanism 
she  had  picked  up,  God  knew  where,  while  waiting  for  love  to 
come?  .  .  . 

"Carlisle,"  he  began,  patiently,  "I  understand  your  feelings 
perfectly,  of  course,  and  natural  enough  they  are  to  a  girl  brought 
up  as  you  've  been.  At  the  same  time,  I  'm  not  willing  to  leave 
you  feeling  disgusted  with  your  father's  methods  of  — " 

"Disgusted  with  papa!"  exclaimed  Cally,  quite  indignantly. 
But  she  added,  in  a  much  more  tempered  tone:  "Why,  Hugo  — 
how  could  you  think  such  a  thing?  ...  I  assure  you  I  'm  disgusted 
with  nobody  on  earth  but  myself." 

At  that  the  annoyed  young  man  gave  a  light  laugh. 

"I'm  evidently  about  fifty  years  before  the  war,  as  you  say 
down  here.  I  can't  understand,  to  save  me,  how  — " 

"I  know  it,  Hugo.  You  never  understand  how  I  feel  about 
things,  and  always  assume  that  I  '11  feel  the  way  you  want  me  to." 

Carlisle  spoke  quietly,  almost  gently.  Yet  Canning's  feeling 
was  like  that  of  a  man  who,  in  the  dark,  steps  down  from  a  piazza 
at  a  point  where  steps  are  not.  The  jolt  drove  some  of  the  blood 
from  his  cheek.  But  his  only  reply  was  to  poke  his  hired  driver 
in  the  back  with  his  stick  and  say,  distantly:  "Nine  hundred  and 
three  Washington." 

The  hired  car  rolled  swiftly,  in  sun  and  wind,  toward  the 
House  of  Heth.  Cobblestones  were  left  behind;  the  large  wheels 
skimmed  the  fair  asphaltum.  Three  city  blocks  they  went  with 
no  music  of  human  speech.  .  .  . 

406 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"But  I  did  n't  mean  to  seem  rude,"  said  Cally,  in  a  perfectly 
natural  manner,  "and  I  am  really  very  sorry  to  —  to  change  the 
afternoon's  plans.  I  don't  feel  quite  well,  and  I  think  perhaps 
I  ought  to  rest  —  just  till  dinner-time.  You  remember  you  are 
dining  with  us  to-night." 

The  apology,  the  pacific,  non-controversial  tone,  unbent  the 
young  man  instantly.  Small  business  for  the  thinking  sex  to  har 
bor  a  grudge  against  an  irrational  woman's  moment  of  pique. 
Moreover,  whatever  this  woman's  foibles,  Hugo  Canning  chanced 
to  find  himself  deep  in  love  with  her.  He  met  her  advance  with 
only  a  slight  trace  of  stiffness.  By  the  time  they  arrived  at  the 
Heth  house,  mamma's  two  young  people  were  chatting  along 
almost  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  .  .  . 

However,  back  at  home,  Cally  seemed  unresponsive  to  Hugo's 
overture  in  the  direction  of  his  lingering  awhile  in  the  drawing- 
room.  It  became  evident  that  the  afternoon  was  ruined  beyond 
repair.  He  paused  but  a  moment,  to  see  whether  any  telegrams 
or  telephone  calls  had  been  sent  up  for  him  from  the  hotel. 

It  proved  that  there  was  nothing  of  the  sort.  The  lover  looked 
relieved.  He  wished  his  lady  a  refreshing  rest,  apropos  of  the 
evening.  Beneath  his  feeling  that  he  was  an  ill-used  man,  there 
had  risen  in  Canning  the  practical  thought  that  he  had  let  this 
wild  sweet  thing  get  too  sure  of  him.  .  .  . 

"I  shall  see  you  then,"  said  he,  at  the  door,  "at  seven- thirty." 

"Yes,  indeed.  ...  I'll  be  quite  myself  again  then.  Au  re- 
voir!" 

She  stood  alone,  in  the  dim  and  silent  hall.  The  house  was  sweet 
with  Hugo's  flowers.  Cally,  standing,  picked  a  red  rose  slowly 
to  pieces.  She  could  pursue  her  own  thoughts  now,  and  her  strug 
gle  was  against  thinking  ill  of  her  father.  If  it  was  the  extreme  of 
sympathy  with  the  poor  to  regard  the  Works  as  a  homicidal  place, 
then  her  present  impulse  was  plainly  toward  such  extremity.  But 
she  dared  not  allow  that  impulse  its  head,  fearful  of  the  far- 
reaching  consequences  that  would  thereby  be  entailed.  Yet, 
even  from  the  cheeriest  view,  it  was  clear  that  the  Works  were 
a  pretty  bad  place  —  Hugo  himself  had  tacitly  admitted  that 
by  the  arguments  he  employed,  —  and  if  that  was  so,  what  was  to 

407 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


be  said  for  papa?  Possibly  she  and  mamma  did  have  some  con 
nection  with  the  business,  but  it  would  be  simply  foolish  to  say 
that  they  were  responsible  for  the  overcrowding  in  the  bunching- 
room.  How  could  she  be  —  how  could  she?  —  she,  to  whom  her 
father  had  never  spoken  seriously  in  his  life,  who  had  never  even 
seen  the  Works  inside  till  to-day?  No,  it  was  papa's  business. 
He  was  responsible;  and  it  was  a  responsibility  indeed.  .  .  . 

It  was  quarter-past  five.  So,  presently,  the  tall  hall-clock  said, 
on  its  honor  as  a  reliable  timepiece.  .  .  .  Only  an  hour  since  she 
and  Hugo  had  met  in  front  of  Morland's.  .  .  . 

Still  the  girl  did  not  hurry  up  to  her  rest-chamber.  She  wan 
dered  pointlessly  from  empty  hall  to  silent  drawing-room.  There 
had  descended  upon  her  that  sense  of  loneliness  in  the  great  world, 
to  which  in  the  spring  and  summer  she  had  been  no  stranger.  She 
felt  listless  and  oddly  tired.  Presently,  when  she  had  thought 
about  it  a  little,  she  was  certain  that  she  felt  quite  unwell;  al 
most  ill.  The  strong  probability  was  that  she  had  a  bad  sick 
headache  coming  on;  small  wonder,  either,  after  nearly  fainting 
with  poor  Miller  and  others  at  the  Works.  .  .  . 

Cally  considered  whether  she  did  not  owe  it  to  her  health  to 
dine  from  a  tray  this  evening,  giving  Hugo  to-morrow  morning 
instead.  Even  as  she  revolved  this  thought  —  with  especial 
reference  to  explaining  it  to  mamma  —  there  came  her  humble 
admirer,  Flora  Johnson,  coPd,  saying  that  Mr.  Canning  begged 
to  speak  to  her  a  minute  at  the  telephone. 

"Mr.  Canning?" 

Flora  said  yas'm,  and  flashed  her  dazzling  teeth.  Her  mistress 
ascended  the  stairs  in  surprise,  wondering  what  reason  Hugo 
would  assign  for  wanting  to  come  back. 

However,  Hugo's  intentions  were  the  contrary.  His  unhappy 
request  was  to  be  excused  from  dinner  this  evening. 

The  young  man's  voice  over  the  wire  was  at  once  regretful, 
annoyed,  and  (somewhat)  apologetic.  There  was,  it  seemed,  the 
devil  to  pay  over  certain  entanglements  of  the  rate-case  matter. 
He  had  found  Mr.  Deming,  of  his  law  firm,  waiting  for  him  at  the 
hotel.  Mr.  Deming  had  come  for  a  conference  which  could  not 
be  postponed;  he  had  to  get  back  to  Washington  by  the  nine- 

408 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

thirty  train.  Would  Carlisle  make  his  excuses  to  Mrs.  Heth,  and 
know  for  herself  how  disappointed  he  was? 

He  spoke  in  loverly  vein,  and  Cally  was  able  to  answer  sooth 
ingly.  She  mentioned  that  she  would  probably  withdraw  from 
the  dinner,  too;  so  that  even  mamma's  table  would  not  be  upset 
at  all.  He  would  be  much  missed,  of  course.  The  suggestion 
emerged,  or  perhaps  it  was  merely  in  the  air,  that  Hugo  was  to 
come  in,  if  he  could,  in  the  later  evening. 

Cally  was  at  the  telephone  some  three  minutes.  Turning  away, 
she  did  not  go  at  once  to  rest,  though  now  halfway  to  her  room. 
If  she  was  not  going  to  dinner,  there  was  more  time,  of  course. 
Or  possibly  her  head  had  tak£n  a  slight  turn  for  the  better.  The 
girl  leaned  against  the  banisters  in  the  quiet  upper  hall,  full  of 
depression.  And  then  she  said  aloud,  with  a  resolution  that  was 
perhaps  not  so  sudden  as  it  seemed: 

"I'll  go  and  see  Hen  Cooney!" 


XXIX 

One  Hour,  in  which  she  apologizes  twice  for  her  Self,  her  Life  and 
Works;  and  once  she  is  beautifully  forgiven,  and  once  she  never 
will  be,  this  Side  of  the  Last  Trump. 

THE  Cooneys'  door  was  opened,  after  the  delay  usual  with 
the  poor,  by  Henrietta  herself,  this  moment  returned 
from  the  bookstore.  Hen  wore  her  hat,  but  not  her  coat, 
and  it  was  to  be  observed  that  one  hand  held  a  hot-water  bottle, 
imperfectly  concealed  behind  her  back. 

"Hurrah!  —  Cally!"  cried  she.  "We  were  talking  of  you  at 
dinner  to-day,  wondering  what  had  become  of  you.  Come  into 
the  house,  and  don't  mind  a  bit  if  this  bottle  leaks  all  over  you. 
Such  troubles!" 

"How  is  Chas  to-day?  I  just  heard  that  he  had  n't  been  at 
work  for  a  week." 

"  Chas?  . . .  Chas  is  better  —  Cousin  Martha 's  worse — father 's 
just  the  same  —  Looloo's  dancing  the  floor  with  a  toothache." 
Hen  recited  this  in  the  manner  of  a  chant,  and  added,  as  she 
ushered  her  Washington  Street  cousin  into  the  little  parlor:  "But 
for  that,  we're  all  doing  nicely  —  thank  you!  " 

"Gracious,  Hen!  I'd  no  idea  you  had  such  a  hospital.  Why, 
what's  the  matter  with  Uncle  John?" 

"Oh,  just  his  lumbago.  He's  complaining,  but  out  and  about 
—  fighting  over  the  Seven  Days  around  Richmond  with  an  old 
comrade  somewhere,  I  doubt  not.  .  .  .  Sit  down,  my  dear," 
added  Hen,  who  had  been  looking  at  Cally  just  a  little  curiously, 
"and  excuse  me  while  I  run  upstairs.  I  forgot  to  explain  that  this 
bottle  is  for  mother,  who 's  down  with  a  splitting  headache.  Back 
in  a  jiffy.  .  .  ." 

Thus  Miss  Cooney,  not  knowing  that  for  one  moment,  at  least, 
her  society  had  been  preferred  above  that  of  a  Canning.  Such  was 

410 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

the  odd  little  development.  Carlisle,  having  been  more  with 
Henrietta  in  the  past  five  weeks  than  she  had  commonly  been  in 
a  year,  had  discovered  her  as  undoubtedly  a  person  you  could 
talk  things  over  with  —  the  only  person  in  the  world,  perhaps, 
that  you  could  talk  this  over  with.  .  .  . 

Possibly  Hen,  being  a  lynx-eyed  Cooney,  had  somehow  gath 
ered  that  her  lovely  cousin  had  not  dropped  in  merely  to  "in 
quire";  for  when  she  returned  to  the  parlor,  having  doubtless 
put  her  hot-water  bottle  where  it  would  do  the  most  good,  she 
did  not  expend  much  time  on  reporting  upon  her  invalids,  or 
become  involved  in  the  minor  doings  of  the  day.  Very  soon  she 
deflected,  saying: 

"But  you  don't  look  particularly  fit  yourself,  Cally.  What's 
wrong  with  the  world?" 

Cally,  being  still  uncertain  how  far  she  cared  to  confide  in  Hen, 
met  the  direct  question  with  a  tentative  lightness. 

"Oh!  ...  Well,  I  did  just  have  a  rather  unpleasant  experience, 
though  I  did  n't  know  I  showed  it  in  my  face !  .  .  .  We  happened 
to  look  in  at  the  Works  for  a  few  minutes  —  Mr.  Canning  and  1 
—  and  I  certainly  did  n't  enjoy  it  much  ..."  And  then,  the  inner 
pressure  overcoming  her  natural  bent  toward  reserve,  she  spoke 
with  a  little  burst:  "  Oh,  Hen,  it  was  the  most  horrible  place  I  ever 
saw  in  my  life!  " 

The  little  confidence  spoke  straight  to  the  heart,  as  a  touch 
of  genuine  feeling  always  will.  Quite  unconsciously,  Henrietta 
took  her  cousin's  hand,  saying, "  You  poor  dear  ..."  And  within 
a  minute  or  two  Cally  was  eagerly  pouring  out  all  that  she  had 
seen  in  the  bunching-room,  with  at  least  a  part  of  how  it  had 
made  her  feel. 

Hen  listened  sympathetically,  and  spoke  reassuringly.  If  her 
"  arguments  "  followed  close  in  the  footsteps  of  Hugo,  —  for  Hen 
was  surprisingly  well-informed  in  unexpected  ways,  —  it  must 
have  been  some  quality  in  her,  something  or  other  in  her  under 
lying  "attitude,"  that  invested  her  words  with  a  new  horse 
power  of  solace.  And  Saltman's  best  stenographer  actually 
produced  an  argument  that  Hugo  had  altogether  passed  by.  She 
thought  it  worth  while  to  point  out  that  these  things  were  not 

411 


V. 


V.'s 


Eyes 


a  question  of  abstract  morals  at  all,  but  only  of  changing  points 
of  view.  .  .  . 

"When  Uncle  Thornton  learned  business,"  declared  Hen, 
"there  was  n't  a  labor  law  in  the  country  —  no  law  but  supply 
and  demand  —  pay  your  work-people  as  little  as  you  could,  and 
squeeze  them  all  they  'd  stand  for.  Nobody  ever  thought  of  any 
thing  different.  In  those  days  the  Works  would  have  been  a 
model  plant  —  nine-hour  day,  high  wages,  no  women  working 
at  night,  no  children.  ..." 

If  Cally  was  not  wholly  heartened  by  words  like  these,  she 
knew  where  the  lack  was.  And  perhaps  Hen  herself  was  con 
scious  of  something  missing.  For,  having  defended  her  uncle's 
Works  at  least  as  loyally  as  she  honestly  could,  she  gave  the  talk 
a  more  personal  tone,  skirting  those  phases  of  the  matter  so  new- 
thoughty  that  they  had  never  even  occurred  to  Hugo  Canning. 

"Cally,  are  you  going  to  speak  to  Uncle  Thornton  about  it  — 
about  your  going  there,  I  mean?" 

"  No,  no ! "  cried  Cally,  hastily.  "  How  could  I?  Of  course  I  — 
realize  that  that's  the  way  business  must  be  —  as  you  say. 
What  right  have  I,  an  ignorant  little  fool,  to  set  up  as  papa's 
critic?" 

"None  at  all  —  of  course,"  said  Hen,  giving  her  hand  a  little 
squeeze.  "What  I  —  " 

"You  surely  can't  think  that  I  ought  to  go  and  reprove  papa 
for  the  way  he  runs  his  business  —  do  you,  Hen?  .  .  .  That  I  — 
I'm  responsible  in  any  way!" 

Hen  noted  her  cousin's  unexplained  nervousness,  and  it  may 
be  she  divined  a  little  further.  She  answered  no,  not  a  bit  of  it. 
She  said  she  meant  to  speak  to  him,  not  as  a  business  expert,  but 
only  as  his  daughter.  It  was  always  a  mistake  to  have  secrets  in  a 
family,  said  Hen. 

Good  advice,  undoubtedly.  Only  Hen  did  n't  happen  to  know 
the  most  peculiar  circumstances.  .  .  . 

The  two  girls  sat  side  by  side  on  a  sofa  that  sorely  needed  the 
ministrations  of  an  upholsterer.  Hen  was  sweet-faced,  but  habit 
ually  pale,  usually  a  little  worn.  Her  eyes  and  expression  saved 
her  from  total  eclipse  in  whatever  company;  otherwise  she  would 

412 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


have  been  annihilated  now  by  the  juxtaposition  of  her  cousin. 
Cally's  face  was  framed  in  an  engaging  little  turn-down  hat  of 
gold-brown  and  yellow,  about  which  was  carelessly  festooned  a 
long  and  fine  brown  veil.  Hen,  gazing  rather  wistfully,  thought 
that  Cally  grew  lovelier  every  year. 

"I'll  tell  you,  Cally!"  she  said,  suddenly.  "Do  you  know 
what  you  ought  to  do?  Talk  to  V.  V.  about  all  this!" 

Cally  repressed  a  little  start;  though  the  thought,  to  speak 
truth,  was  far  from  being  a  new  one.  But  how  could  she  possibly 
talk  to  V.  V.  without  the  ultimate  disloyalty  to  papa?  .  .  . 

"No,"  she  said,  quietly,  after  a  brief  pause.  "I  could  hardly 
do  that." 

"  Why  not?  He  's  thought  out  all  these  things  further  than 
anybody  I  know.  And  he'll  — " 

"Hen,  have  you  forgotten  what  he  wrote  in  the  paper  about 
papa  last  year  —  what  he 's  going  to  write  next  month.  Don't  you 
see  my  position?  " 

"I  don't  care  what  he  writes  in  the  papers !  .  .  .  When  it  comes 
to  people,  there's  nobody  so  kind  —  and  wise.  And  — " 

"He's  the  one  person,"  said  Cally,  resolutely,  "I  could  not  pos 
sibly  talk  to  about  it." 

Henrietta,  falling  back  on  the  thought  she  had  set  out  with, 
laughed  good-naturedly. 

"Then,  I  suppose,  you '11  want  to  fly  at  once.  He's  due  here 
at  any  minute,  you  know  —  in  fact,  he's  half  an  hour  late 


"Here!  ...   Is  he  coming  here  this  afternoon?" 

This  time  her  start  was  without  concealment.  Hen  looked 
genuinely  surprised. 

"He's  our  doctor  —  I  told  you  the  other  day.  ...  But  he 
does  n't  bite,  my  dear!  You  look  as  if  I'd  said  that  a  grizzly 
bear  and  three  mad  ogres  were  loping  down  the  steps." 

"I  never  think  of  him  as  a  doctor  somehow,"  said  Cally,  recov 
ering,  with  a  little  laugh.  "So  I  could  n't  imagine  — " 

"Second  largest  practice  in  town  —  only  I'll  admit  that  his 
not  charging  any  fees  has  something  to  do  with  it.  In  fact  V.  V.'s 
patients  usually  borrow  anything  that 's  loose,  including  his  hats, 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

suits,  and  shoes  .  .  .  Cally,  it 's  like  a  play,  for  I  believe  there 
he  is  now.  .  .  ." 

True  enough,  a  firm  but  unequal  footstep  just  then  sounded 
on  the  Cooneys'  wooden  steps  outside.  But  Hen  sat  still,  a  far 
away  look  in  her  eyes. 

"Did  you  hear  what  Pond  said,  Cally,  the  first  time  he  saw 
V.  V.?  —  '  Who's  that  man  with  the  face  like  a  bishop  that  never 
grew  up?'  .  .  .  Do  you  know,  I  never  look  at  him  without  remem 
bering  mean  things  I  've  done  and  said,  and  wishing  I  had  n't. ..." 

She  rose  as  the  bell  rang,  started  toward  the  door,  hesitated, 
turned  in  the  middle  of  the  floor. 

"I'd  naturally  ask  him  in  here,  Cally,  while  I  went  up  to  see 
if  things  are  ready  for  him  upstairs.  Of 'course,  if  you'd  rather 
not  see  him  .  .  ." 

Cally  had  risen  too.  The  two  girls  stood  looking  at  each  other. 

"No,"  said  Cally,  "I'd  like  to  see  him.  Only  I  can't  speak  to 
him 'about  the  Works.  I  cannot." 

"No,  no  —  of  course  not,  dear,  if  you  don't  feel  like  it." 

Hen  went  out  to  open  the  door.   Greetings  floated  in.  ... 

Cally  stood  at  the  parlor  window,  staring  out  into  the  shabby 
street.  Over  the  way  was  the  flaring  sign  of  an  unpained  dentist, 
making  promises  never  to  be  redeemed,  and  two  doors  away  the 
old  stand  of  the  artificial  limb-maker.  Cally  looked  full  at  a 
show-window  full  of  shiny  new  legs;  but  she  did  not  see  the 
grisly  spectacle,  so  it  did  not  matter. 

The  unexpected  encounter  was  deeply  disturbing  to  her. 
There  stirred  in  her  the  memory  of  another  night  when  she  had 
similarly  met  the  slum  doctor  in  this  room,  between  engagements 
with  Hugo  Canning.  That  night  he  had  asked  her  forgiveness  for 
calling  her  a  poor  little  thing,  which  she  was,  and  she  had  charged 
him  with  wicked  untruthfulness  for  calling  the  Works  homicidal, 
which  —  she  said  it  in  her  secret  heart  —  they  were.  .  .  .  How 
history  repeats  itself,  how  time  brought  changed  angles !  Strange, 
strange,  that  in  the  revolving  months  it  had  now  come  her  turn 
to  apologize  to  Mr.  V.  V.  in  the  Cooney  parlor.  Only  she  could 
not  make  her  apology,  no  matter  how  much  she  might  want 

to 

414 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"...  Stop  a  minute,"  Hen  was  heard  to  say,  "and  pass  the 
time  of  day  .  .  ." 

Unintelligible  murmuring,  and  then:  "D'  you  know  who  it 
was  that  invented  stopping  and  passing  the  time  of  day?"  said 
the  nearing  voice  of  Mr.  V.  V.,  gayer  than  Cally  Heth  had  ever 
heard  it.  "Take  my  word,  't  was  a  woman." 

"To  make  things  pleasant  for  some  man!  —  and  we've  been 
doing  it  ever  since.  .  .  .  Cally  Heth's  here  .  .  ." 

The  two  came  in.  Cally,  turning,  held  out  her  hand  to  the 
Cooneys'  physician,  with  a  sufficiently  natural  air  and  greet 
ing.  .  .  . 

They  had  not  met  since  the  afternoon  at  the  Woman's  Club,  a 
day  which  had  brought  a  strange  change  in  their  relations.  But 
then,  each  of  their  meetings  seemed  marked  by  some  such  realign 
ment,  and  always  to  his  advantage.  Again  and  again  she  had  put 
this  man  down,  at  first  with  all  her  strength;  and  each  time  when 
she  turned  and  looked  at  him  again,  behold  he  had  shot  up  higher 
than  ever. 

So  Cally  had  just  been  thinking.  But  now  that  V.  Vivian  stood 
in  the  room,  and  she  looked  at  him,  she  was  suddenly  reminded 
that  he  was  her  good  friend  nevertheless.  And  something  like 
ease  came  back  to  her. 

When  Hen  had  disappeared  to  make  the  sick-room  ready  (or 
for  whatever  purpose  she  went),  Cally  said: 

"I  hope  Chas  is  n't  really  going  to  be  ill?" 

"Oh,  there's  no  trouble  at  all  with  him,"  replied  the  young 
man,  "  but  to  make  him  stay  in  bed.  It's  all  come  down  to  a 
touch  of  sore  throat,  a  little  sort  of  quinsy.  We  were  rather  afraid 
of  diphtheria,  the  other  night." 

"My  cousins  are  having  more  than  their  share,  just  now.  So 
many,  many  invalids.  ...  I  hope  you've  been  well,  since  I  saw 
you  last?" 

"Oh,  thank  you!  —  I've  the  health  of  a  letter-carrier.  At 
least,  I  assume  they  're  naturally  healthy,  though  as  a  matter  of 
fact  I  've  had  three  or  four  postmen  on  my  list  ...  I  'm  afraid  I 
interrupted  you  and  Henrietta?  " 

"Oh,  no!  —  Or  rather,  I  imagine  she  was  only  too  glad 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


to  be  interrupted.  ...  I  was  telling  her  all  my  troubles,  you 
see." 

"Have  you  troubles?  I'm  sorry." 

The  man  spoke  in  a  light  tone,  such  as  is  suitable  for  friend 
ships.  Yet  he  must  have  felt  a  throe  then,  remembering  his  arti 
cles:  now  so  soon  to  go  to  the  "Chronicle"  office  and  the  print 
that  cried  aloud.  And  the  girl's  case,  had  he  but  known  it,  was 
like  his  own,  only  more  so.  Beneath  the  cover  of  her  casual  talk, 
she  was  aware  of  thought  coursing  like  a  palpitating  vein  under 
a  fine  skin,  threatening  to  break  through  at  any  minute.  .  .  . 

"Oh,  so  many,"  said  Cally. 

They  had  remained  standing,  for  to  ask  the  doctor  to  sit 
down  had  not  occurred  to  her.  The  girl  glanced  toward  the 
window. 

"And  what  do  you  suppose  Hen's  prescription  was?  .  .  .  That 
I  should  take  them  all  to  you." 

There  was  the  briefest  silence. 

"But,  of  course,  you  did  n't  want  to  do  that?" 

She  hesitated,  and  said:  "Yes,  I  do  want  to  ...  But  I 
can't." 

That  was  the  utmost  that  she  meant  to  say.  But  then,  as 
she  glanced  again  at  the  lame  alien  whom  time  had  so  beauti 
fully  justified,  more  of  her  inner  tide  overflowed  suddenly  into 
speech. 

"Do  you  know  —  I  feel  that  I  could  tell  you  almost  anything 
—  things  I  would  n't  tell  Hen,  or  anybody.  .  .  .  Oh,  I  could,  I 
don't  know  why.  You  don't  know  for  what  a  long  time  I've 
thought  of  you  as  my  confidant,  my  friend.  .  .  .  Only,  you  see  — 
these  troubles  are  n't  all  my  own.  ..." 

She  stopped  rather  precipitately,  turned  away  a  little;  stood 
twisting  a  glove  between  her  fingers,  and  doing  her  best  to  show 
by  her  look  that  she  had  not  said  anything  in  particular.  .  .  . 

The  thoughts  of  these  two  were  over  hills  and  dales  apart;  and 
yet,  by  the  nature  of  what  was  between  them,  they  followed  hard 
on  the  same  trail.  V.  V.  was  far  from  possessing  the  Cooneys' 
detective  gift.  He  saw  only  that  this  girl  was  troubled  about 
something;  and  if  his  own  thought  never  left  the  Heth  Works,  it 

416 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

was  only  because  this  was  the  point  where  his  connection  with 
her  troubles  cut  him  deep. 

So  in  his  ears  chirped  the  voice  of  his  now  familiar:  "Who 
appointed  you  a  judge  of  people  like  this?  Who  knows  better 
than  you  that  they  're  doing  the  best  they  can?  Tear  up  that 
stuff!  .  .  ." 

But  aloud  he  said  only:  "I  understand  that,  of  course.  And 
I'm  grateful  for  the  rest  you  say." 

And  Cally,  five  feet  away  from  him,  was  learning  that  in  some 
matters  the  business  logic  of  it  did  n't  help  very  much,  that  what 
counted  was  how  you  felt  about  them  in  your  heart.  If  something 
terrible  should  happen  at  the  Works  now,  if  the  building  did  fall 
down  some  day,  collapsing  with  all  those  girls  —  did  she  think 
she  could  look  again  into  this  man's  eyes  and  say:  "Well,  /  had 
nothing  to  do  with  it  ?  ..." 

But  neither  were  her  thoughts  for  publication;  and  she 
bridged  the  brief  gap  in  the  conversation  with  a  not  particularly 
successful  smile,  designed  to  show  that  of  course  nobody  was 
taking  all  this  very  seriously. 

"  But  why  expect  to  do  what  we  want?  No  one  can,"  said  she. 
"You  don't  mind  my  fidgeting  about  the  room  this  way,  do  you? 
I  seem  a  little  out  of  humor  to-day  —  not  myself  at  all,  as  I  was 
told  just  now.  ..." 

V.  V.  said  that  he  did  not  mind. 

"I  wonder,"  she  went  on,  "if  you  remember  something  you 
said  in  your  speech  the  other  day?  —  about  being  free.  ...  It 
seemed  strange  to  me  then,  that  you  should  have  happened  to 
say  just  that,  for  I  —  I  've  come  to  realize  that,  in  a  kind  of  way, 
that 's  always  been  a  wild  dream  of  my  own.  .  .  .  Don't  you  think 
—  where  there  are  so  many  things  to  think  about,  things  and 
people  —  that  it's  pretty  hard  to  be  free?" 

"Hard?  .  .  .  There's  nothing  else  like  it  on  earth  for  hard 
ness." 

V.  V.  stood  grasping  the  back  of  an  ancient  walnut  chair.  It 
was  seen  that  he  belonged  in  this  room,  simple  home  of  poverty; 
different  from  the  girl,  who  was  so  obviously  the  rich  exotic,  the 
transient  angel  in  the  house. 

417 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


He  added:  "But  it's  always  seemed  to  me  worth  all  the  price 
of  trying." 

"  Oh,  it  is  —  I  'm  sure.  And  yet  ...  It  seems  to  me  —  I  've 
thought,"  said  Cally,  somewhat  less  conversationally,  "that  life, 
for  a  woman,  especially,  is  something  like  one  of  those  little  toy 
theatres  —  you  Ve  seen  them?  —  where  pasteboard  actors  slide 
along  in  little  grooves  when  you  pull  their  strings.  They  move 
along  very  nicely,  and  you  —  you  might  think  they  were  going  in 
that  direction  just  because  they  wanted  to.  But  they  never  get 
out  of  their  grooves.  ...  I  know  you  '11  think  that  a  —  a  weak 
theory." 

"No,  I  know  it's  a  true  theory." 

Surely  the  girl  could  not  have  been  thinking  only  of  her 
father's  business  as  she  went  on,  more  and  more  troubled  in 
voice: 

"So  much  seems  to  be  all  fixed  and  settled,  before  one's  old 
enough  to  know  anything  about  it  —  and  then  there 's  a  great 
deal  of  pressure  —  and  a  great  deal  of  restraint  —  in  so  many 
different  ways.  .  .  .  Don't  you  think  it 's  hard  ever  to  get  out  of 
one's  groove?  " 

"It's  heroic." 

She  put  back  her  trailing  motor- veil,  and  said:  "And  for  a 
woman  especially?" 

"It  would  take  the  strength  of  all  the  gods!  ...  I  mean,  of 
course  —  as  women  are  placed,  to-day.  Perhaps  in  some  other 
day  —  perhaps  to-morrow  — " 

He  broke  off  suddenly;  a  change  passed  over  his  face. 

"And  yet,"  he  added,  in  a  voice  gentle  and  full  of  feeling  — 
"some  of  them  are  doing  it  to-day." 

What  his  thought  might  be,  she  had  no  idea;  but  his  persoi 
implication  was  not  to  be  mistaken.  The  man  from  the  slums, 
who  had  mistakenly  put  his  faith  in  her  once  before  in  the  Coon- 
eys'  parlor,  conceived  that  she  was  or  might  be  one  of  thf 
strong  he  spoke  of;  little  suspecting  her  present  unconquerable 
weakness. 

Cally  was  startled  into  looking  at  him,  a  thing  she  had  beer 
rather  avoiding;  and  looking,  she  looked  instantly  away.   L 

418 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

Mr.  V.  V.'s  eyes,  that  strange  trusting  look,  which  had  not  been 
frequently  observable  there  of  late,  had  saluted  her  like  a  banner 
of  stars.  .  .  . 

"Certainly  I  was  not  meant  to  be  one  of  them,"  said  she, 
rather  faintly. 

He  must  have  meant  only  a  general  expression  of  confidence, 
she  was  sure  of  that;  only  to  be  kind  and  comforting.  But  to  her, 
grappling  with  new  hard  problems,  that  strange  gaze  came  like  a 
torch  lit  in  a  cave  at  night.  Much  she  had  wondered  how  Vivian 
could  possibly  hold  her  responsible  for  what  her  father  did,  or 
left  undone.  And  now  in  a  flash  it  was  all  quite  clear,  and  she 
saw  that  he  had  not  been  holding  her  responsible  at  all.  No,  this 
simple  and  good  man,  who  let  the  crows  bring  his  raiment,  or 
not,  as  they  preferred,  had  only  reposed  a  trust  in  her  —  in  Cally 
Heth.  It  was  as  if,  that  day  at  the  Settlement,  he  had  said  to  her, 
by  his  eyes:  "I  know  you.  Once  you  go  to  the  Works,  you  won't 
rest  till  you've  made  things  better.  ..." 

But  instead  of  this  making  things  better  for  Cally  Heth  now,  it 
seemed  to  make  them  worse  at  once.  She  became  considerably 
agitated;  knew  that  he  must  see  her  agitation,  and  did  not  mind 
at  all.  And  suddenly  she  sat  down  on  the  sway-backed  sofa  be 
tween  the  windows.  .  .  . 

"I'm  the  last  woman  in  the  world  ever  to  think  of  getting  out 
of  my  groove,"  said  Cally,  her  cheek  upon  her  hand. 

And  then,  with  no  premeditation  at  all,  there  came  strange 
words  from  her,  words  clothing  with  unlessoned  ease  thoughts  that 
certainly  she  had  never  formulated  for  Hugo  Canning. 

"And  yet  I  feel  that  it  might  have  been  different.  I've  felt  — 
lately  —  as  if  I  have  n't  had  much  of  a  chance  ...  I  think  I  have 
a  mind,  or  had  one  .  .  .  some  —  some  spirit  and  independence, 
too.  But  I  was  n't  trained  to  express  myself  that  way;  that  was 
all  ironed  down  flat  in  me.  I  never  had  any  education,  except 
what  was  superficial  —  showy.  I  was  never  taught  to  think,  or  to 
do  anything  —  or  to  have  any  part  in  serious  things.  No  one  ever 
told  me  that  I  ought  to  justify  my  existence,  to  pay  my  way.  No 
body  ever  thought  of  me  as  fit  to  have  any  share  in  anything  use 
ful  or  important  —  fit  for  any  responsibility  .  .  .  No,  life  for  me 

419 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

was  to  be  like  butterflies  flying,  and  my  part  was  only  to  make 
myself  as  ornamental  as  I  could.  ..." 

V.  Vivian,  who  wrote  articles  about  the  Huns  in  newspapers, 
stood  at  the  Cooney  mantel.  He  did  not  move  at  all;  the  man's 
gaze  upon  her  half -a  verted  face  did  not  wink  once.  His  own  face, 
this  girl  had  thought,  was  one  for  strange  expressions;  but  she 
might  have  thought  the  look  it  wore  now  stranger  than  any  she 
had  ever  seen  there.  .  .  . 

"Maybe,  it's  that  way  with  all  women,  more  or  less  —  only 
it  seems  to  have  been  always  more  with  me  ...  Money!"  said 
the  low  hurried  voice  —  "how  I've  breathed  it  in  from  the  first 
moment  I  can  remember.  Money,  money,  money!  .  .  .  Has  it 
been  altogether  my  fault  if  I've  measured  everything  by  it, 
supposed  that  it  was  the  other  name  for  happiness  —  taken  all  of 
it  I  could  get?  I  've  always  taken,  you  see  —  never  given.  I  never 
gave  anything  to  anybody  in  my  life.  I  never  did  anything  for 
anybody  in  my  life.  I  'm  a  grown  woman  —  an  adult  human 
being  —  but  I  'm  not  of  the  slightest  use  to  anybody.  I  've  held 
out  both  hands  to  life,  expecting  them  to  be  filled,  kept  full  ..." 
She  paused  and  was  deflected  by  a  fleeting  memory,  some 
thing  heard  in  a  church,  perhaps,  long  ago.  .  .  . 

"Is  n't  there,"  she  asked,  "something  in  the  Bible  about  that? 
—  horse-leech's    daughters  —  or    something?  —  always    crying 
'Give,  give'?  .  .  ." 
There  was  a  perceptible  pause. 
"Well  —  something  of  the  sort,  I  believe.  .  .  ." 
She  had  seemed  to  have  the  greatest  confidence  that,  if  any 
thing  of  the  sort  was  in  the  Bible,  this  man  would  know  it  in 
stantly.   However,  his  tone  caught  her  attention,  and  she  raised 
her  eyes.  Mr.  V.  V.'s  face  was  scarlet. 

"I  see,"  said  Cally,  colorlessly,  out  of  the  silence,  "you  had 
already  thought  of  me  as  one  of  those  daughters.  .  .  .  Why  not?  " 

"Of  you!  Not  in  my  life,"  cried  V.  V "I  ...  it's  - 

"Why  should  n't  you?  I  know  that 's  what  I  am.  You  're  —  " 

"Don't ...  I  can't  let  things  be  put  upside  down  like  that." 

His  difficulties,  in  the  unhappy  moment,  were  serious.  His 

skin  had  turned  traitor  to  him,  sold  out  his  heart.  And  now,  if 

420 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

he  had  the  necessity  of  saying  something,  his  was  also  the  fear 
lest  he  might  say  too  much.  .  .  . 

"If  I ...  I  appeared  to  look  —  conscious,  when  you  asked  me 
that,  it  was  only  because  of  the  —  the  strange  coincidence.  I  — 
you  compel  me  to  tell  you  —  though  it 's  like  something  from 
another  life." 

He  paused  briefly;  and  when  he  went  on,  his  voice  had  acquired 
something  of  that  light  hardness  which  Cally  had  heard  in  it 
before  now. 

"Once,  a  year  ago,  when  I  had  never  so  much  as  heard  your 
name,  Commissioner  O'Neill  and  I  happened  to  be  talking  about 
the  local  factory  situation,  about  the  point  of  view  of  the  owners 
or,  —  to  be  exactly  honest,  —  the  owners'  families.  By  chance 
—  I  did  use  those  words.  And  O'Neill  said  I  was  a  wild  man  to 
talk  so,  that  if  I  knew  any  of  these  people,  personally,  I  'd  never 
judge  them  so  —  so  unkindly.  ...  It  was  a  long  time  before  I 
saw  .  .  .  how  right  he  might  be.  ...  And  that's  what  I  tried  to 
say  to  you  the  other  day  —  when  I  spoke  of  knowing  the  people. 
I—" 

"Yes,  sometimes  that  makes  a  difference,  I  know."  Had  she 
not  felt  it  only  this  afternoon?  "  But  I  'm  afraid  this  is  n't  one  of 
the  times " 

Cally  rose,  feeling  that  she  desired  to  go.  Nevertheless,  glan 
cing  at  his  troubled  face,  she  was  suddenly  moved  by  perhaps  the 
most  selfless  impulse  she  had  ever  felt  in  her  life. 

"Please,"  she  said,  gently,  "don't  mind  about  that.  I  liked 
you  better  for  it.  I  like  people  to  say  what  they  think.  I  Ve  — " 

"Do  you?  Then  allow  me  to  say  that  I'm  not  quite  a  bitter 
fool " 

The  young  man  was  advancing  toward  her,  throwing  out  his 
hands  in  a  quaint  sort  of  gesture  which  seemed  to  say  that  he  had 
had  about  as  much  of  this  as  he  could  stand. 

"For  surely  I  don't  think  I  am  —  I  don't  think  I'm  quite  so 
dumb  and  blind  as  you  must  think  me.  ..."  His  repressed  air 
was  breaking  up  rapidly,  and  now  he  flung  out  with  unmistakable 
feeling:  "Do  you  suppose  I  could  ever  forget  what  you  did 
last  May!  Not  if  I  tried  a  thousand  years! "  said  Mr.  V.  V.  ... 

421 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"  How  could  I  possibly  think  anything  of  you,  after  that,  but  all 
that  is  brave  and  beautiful?  ..." 

The  two  stood  looking  at  each  other.  Color  came  into  Cally's 
cheek;  came  but  soon  departed.  The  long  gold-and-black  lashes, 
which  surely  had  been  made  for  ornaments,  fluttered  and  fell. 

Out  of  the  dead  silence  she  said,  with  some  difficulty: 

"It 's  very  sweet  of  you  to  say  that." 

Cally  moved  away  from  him,  toward  the  door,  deeply  touched. 
She  had  wanted  to  hear  such  words  as  these,  make  no  doubt  of 
that.  Among  all  her  meetings  with  this  man  last  year,  she  had 
only  that  May  morning  to  remember  without  a  stinging  sense  of 
her  inferiority.  And  she  supposed  that  he  had  forgotten.  .  .  . 

"You  see,"  she  said,  not  without  an  effort,  "  I  have  been  tell 
ing  you  my  troubles,  after  all.  ...  I  —  I  'm  afraid  I  Ve  kept  them 
waiting  for  you  upstairs.  I  must  go." 

But  she  olid  not  leave  the  parlor  at  once,  even  when  Hen,  hear 
ing  the  door  creak  open,  cried  down  that  the  infirmary  was 
ready.  .  .  . 

If  Cally  felt  that  she  had  somehow  confessed  her  weakness  to 
Mr.  V.  V.  —  about  the  Works,  about  life  —  and  been  forgiven  by 
him,  it  seemed  that  even  that  did  not  quite  settle  it  all.  It  must 
have  been  that  one  small  corner  of  her  mind  refused  to  consider 
that  all  this  was  a  closed  episode. 

She  turned,  with  her  hand  on  the  knob. 

"Shall  you  go  to  that  meeting  of  Mr.  Pond's  next  Wednesday 
—  his  meeting  for  workers?  He  has  asked  me  to  go." 

The  young  man  said  that  he  would  be  at  the  meeting;  that  he 
hoped  to  see  her  there. 

Cally  hesitated  again.  Perhaps  she  thought  of  Hugo  then;  or 
perhaps  the  small  unreconstructed  corner  of  her  mind  grew  more 
unrestful. 

"I  'm  not  sure  that  I  '11  be  able  to  go,"  she  said,  slowly.  .  , 
"  Dr.  Vivian  —  is  your  telephone  number  still  the  same  —  Meeg- 
han's  Grocery?    I  —  I  may  want  to  speak  to  you  some  time." 

Yes,  it  was  just  the  same.  Meeghan's  Grocery. 

V.  V.  stood  looking  at  her  from  the  middle  of  the  floor,  one 
hand  raised  to  his  hair  in  his  characteristic  gesture.  His  old- 

422 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

fashioned  sort  of  face  wore  a  far-away  look,  not  so  much  hopeful 
now  as  wistful;  a  look  which  had  been  moving  to  Cally  Heth,  even 
in  the  days  when  she  had  tried  to  dislike  him.  But  of  this,  the 
young  man  from  the  lonely  outskirts  was  not  aware;  of  the  nature 
of  his  replies  he  had  taken  no  note.  In  his  ears  whispered  the 
subtlest  of  all  his  many  voices:  "She'll  never  speak  to  you,  once 
that's  printed.  Tear  it  up.  You've  a  right  to  your  youth.  .  .  ." 

"Good-bye,"  said  Cally,  "and  thank  you." 

"Miss  Heth,"  said  Vivian,  starting,  hurriedly  —  "I  —  if  I  — 
if  it  should  ever  happen  that  I  could  help  you  in  any  way  —  it's 
not  likely,  of  course,  I  understand  that  —  but  if  it  should  ever 
happen  so  —  promise  me  that  you'll  send  for  me." 

But  the  girl  did  not  make  that  promise  then,  her  reply  being: 
"You  have  helped  me  —  you  must  know  that.  .  .  .  You're  the 
one  person  in  the  world  who  has." 

Cally  walked  home  alone,  in  the  dying  effects  of  a  lovely  after 
noon. 

She  had  left  the  Cooney  parlor  in  the  vein  of  one  emerging 
from  strange  adventures  in  undiscovered  countries.  This  queer 
feeling  would  hardly  last  over  the  solid  threshold  of  Home,  whose 
atmosphere  was  almost  notoriously  uncongenial  to  eccentricities 
of  that  sort.  But  it  did  linger  now,  as  Cally  trod  somewhat  dream 
ily  over  streets  that  she  had  long  known  by  heart.  Four  blocks 
there  were;  and  the  half-lights  flickering  between  sky  and  side 
walk  were  of  the  color  of  the  girl's  own  mood. 

In  this  moment  she  was  not  troubled  with  thought,  with  the 
drawing  of  moral  lessons  concerning  duty  or  otherwise.  Now 
Mr.  V.  V.'s  unexpected  last  speeches  to  her  seemed  wholly  to  pos 
sess  her  mind.  She  was  aware  that  they  had  left  her  curiously 
humbled.  .  .  .  Strange  it  seemed,  that  this  man  could  be  so  un 
conscious  of  the  influence  he  had  upon  her,  had  clearly  had  even 
last  year.  Stranger  yet  that  he,  whom  only  the  other  day  she 
had  thought  of  as  so  narrow,  so  religiously  hard,  should  prove 
himself  absurdly  over-generous  in  his  estimate  of  her.  ...  Or  no, 
not  that  exactly.  But,  at  least,  it  would  have  been  absurd,  if  it 
had  not  been  so  sweet.  .  .  . 

423 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

The  revolting  corner  of  her  mind  seemed  now  to  have  laid 
down  arms.  Perhaps  the  girl's  vague  thought  was  that  the  feel 
ings  roused  in  her  in  the  bunching-room  had,  after  all,  been  un 
reasonable,  even  hysterical,  as  Hugo  had  plainly  enough  stated, 
as  Hen  herself  had  partly  argued.  Perhaps  it  was  merely  that  all 
that  trouble  would  keep,  to  be  quietly  pondered  over  at  a  later 
time.  But  rather,  it  seemed  as  if  a  mist  had  settled  down  over  the 
regions  of  practical  thought,  hiding  problems  from  view.  The 
Works  had  somehow  been  swallowed  up  in  that  apologia  she  had 
made,  Cally  Heth's  strange  apology  to  Mr.  V.  V.  for  herself  and 
her  life. 

Cally  walked  slowly  along  the  familiar  street,  her  thoughts  a 
thousand  miles  in  the  blue.  If  the  words  of  the  good  young  man 
had  humbled  her,  they  had  also  mysteriously  stirred  and  up 
lifted.  She  thought  of  his  too  trusting  tribute,  she  thought  of 
what  they  had  said  about  women,  their  strength  and  their  hope 
of  freedom;  and  the  misty  pictures  in  her  mind  were  not  of 
herself  —  for  well  she  had  felt  her  weaknesses  this  day  —  but 
rather  they  were  of  a  dim  emerging  ideal,  of  herself  as  she  might 
some  day  hope  to  be.  Vague  aspirations  were  moving  in  her;  new 
Teachings  of  the  spirit;  dreams  that  spoke  with  strange  voices.  .  .  . 

And,  companied  by  these  ethereal  fancies,  she  came,  before  she 
was  aware  of  it,  to  the  substantial  steps  of  Home,  where  began 
the  snuggest  of  all  snug  grooves.  .  .  . 

She  arrived  with  the  intention,  already  well  formed,  of  retiring 
forthwith  to  her  room,  and  —  probably  —  spending  the  whole 
evening  there.  But  here,  as  it  chanced,  interruption  fell  across 
her  thought.  Just  at  her  own  door,  Cally  almost  ran  into  a  man 
who  was  standing  still  upon  the  sidewalk,  as  if  waiting  for  some 
one:  a  tall  old  gentleman  standing  and  leaning  upon  his  cane. 
Cally  came  out  of  her  absorption  just  in  time  to  escape  collision. 

"I  beg  your  pardon!  .  .  ."  she  began,  with  manner,  stepping 
back. 

But  then  her  feet  faltered,  and  her  voice  died  suddenly  away, 
as  she  saw  that  this  silent  old  man  was  her  neighbor,  Colonel 
John  B.  Dalhousie,  whom  she  had  never  spoken  to  in  her  life. 

The  Colonel  was  regarding  her  with  frightening  fixity.   The 

424 


V.    V.'s     Eye 


girl's  descent  from  the  empyrean  to  reality  had  the  stunning 
suddenness  of  a  fall :  she  showed  it  in  her  blanching  face.  Now, 
as  the  two  thus  stood,  the  old  man  raised  a  hand  and  swept  off 
his  military  hat  in  a  bow  of  elaborate  courtesy. 

"An  apology  from  Miss  Heth,"  said  he,  in  a  purring  voice,  "is 
the  last  thing  on  earth  one  of  my  name  would  have  ventured  to 
expect." 

Doubtless  the  meeting  had  been  obliged  to  come  some  day: 
Cally  had  often  thought  of  it  with  dread,  once  escaped  it  by  a 
narrow  margin.  That  it  should  have  come  now,  in  the  gentler 
afterglow  of  this  curiously  disturbing  day,  seemed  like  the  grim- 
ness  of  destiny.  .  .  .  No  fear  of  over-generosity  here;  no  gleam 
in  these  eyes  of  brave  and  beautiful  things.  .  .  . 

"But  you  ask  my  pardon,"  the  smooth-cutting  voice  went  on. 
"  It  is  granted,  of  course,  my  dear.  You  took  my  son's  heart,  and 
broke  it,  but  that 's  a  bauble.  You  took  his  honor,  and  I  kicked 
him  out,  but  honor 's  a  name  in  a  printed  book.  You  took  his  life, 
and  I  buried  him,  but  sons,  we  know,  cannot  live  forever.  What 
is  there  here  to  make  a  father's  heart  grow  hard?" 

Cally  raised  her  hand  to  her  throat.  She  felt  suffocating,  or 
else  a  little  faint.  From  life  she  seemed  to  have  stepped  into  the 
house  of  dead  men's  bones;  and  here  she  could  see  at  play  old 
emotions  not  met  before  in  her  guarded  life:  shrivelling  contempt, 
undying  hatred,  immortal  unforgiveness.  Nevertheless,  the  sub 
tlest  stroke  in  the  naked  confrontation  was  that  something  in 
the  father's  expression,  distorted  though  it  was,  reminded  her  of 
the  son,  whose  face  in  this  world  she  should  see  no  more. 

She  tried  to  move  past  the  face  of  her  Nemesis,  appeared  phys 
ically  incapable  of  motion;  tried  to  speak,  and  had  little  more 
success. 

"I — I 'm  —  very  sorry  —  for — "  she  said,  indistinctly,  and  her 
ears  were  mocked  with  her  ghastly  inadequacy.  "I  —  I've  —  " 

"  Sorry?  Why,  of  course  you  are.  Doubtless  the  little  unpleas 
antness  has  marred  your  happiness  at  times.  But  I  am  gratified 
to  know  that  you  have  other  young  men  for  your  amusement, 
now  that  my  son  has  withdrawn  himself  from  your  reach." 

The  old  Colonel  stooped  further,  brought  his  stabbing  gaze 

425 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

nearer  her.  There  were  heavy  yellow  pouches  under  his  eyes;  his 
lower  lip,  not  hidden  by  the  stained  white  mustaches,  twitched 
spasmodically. 

"God  looked  and  repented  him  that  he  had  made  man.  I 
might  wish  that  he  'd  made  you  a  man  —  for  just  five  minutes. 
But  what  do  you  imagine  he  thinks  when  he  contemplates  you 
and  your  work,  my  dear?  Eh?  ...  little  she-devil,  pretty  little 
hell-cat!  .  .  ." 

Cally  smothered  a  little  noise  between  a  cry  and  a  sob.  She 
started  away,  by  sheer  strength  of  horror;  somehow  got  away 
from  the  terrible  old  face,  ran  up  her  own  steps.  Glancing  whitely 
over  her  shoulder  from  this  secure  coign,  she  saw  that  Jack  Dal- 
housie's  father  still  stood  unmoving  on  her  sidewalk,  staring  and 
leaning  on  his  cane.  .  .  . 

She  closed  the  door  quickly,  shutting  out  the  sight. 


XXX 

How  it  sounded  like  an  Epitaph,  but  still  she  would  not  cry;  how 
she  thinks  of  the  Beach  again,  and  hugs  a  Hateful  Word  to  her 
Bosom;  how  Hugo  starts  suddenly  on  a  sort  of  Wedding-Trip. 

IN  her  own  room  Carlisle  was  seized  with  a  wild  desire  to  cry. 
Her  spirit,  shocked  past  bearing,  demanded  this  instant  re 
lief.  But  she  fought  down  the  loosening  impulses  within  her, 
knowing  their  worse  than  uselessness;  she  had  shed  her  heart's 
tears  for  this  before  now.  And  her  need  now  was  for  strength; 
strength  to  meet  her  mother  when  need  be,  against  whom  key 
nor  bolt  brought  privacy:  strength,  above  all,  to  wipe  out  this 
mark  set  upon  her  forehead.  .  .  . 

She  resisted  the  impulse  to  fling  herself  face  downward  upon 
the  bed,  which  would  have  been  fatal;  kept  stoutly  upon  her 
feet.  And  presently,  summoning  all  her  courage,  she  stood  at  the 
window  and  peeped,  pale-faced,  between  the  curtains.  All  was 
well  down  there  now.  The  old  avenger  was  gone.  There  were 
only  people  passing  serenely  over  the  familiar  sidewalk,  and  the 
sunlight  dying  where  she  had  stood  and  learned  just  now  that  a 
lie  has  a  long  life. 

Yes,  the  Colonel  was  gone:  and  with  him,  so  it  seemed,  all 
veils  and  draperies,  all  misty  sublimations.  One  does  n't  idealize 
one's  self  too  much,  with  curses  ringing  in  one's  ears. 

Cally  leaned  weakly  against  the  wall,  both  gloved  palms 
pressed  into  the  cold  smoothness  of  her  cheeks.  Somewhere  in  the 
still  house  a  door  suddenly  banged  shut,  and  she  just  repressed  a 
scream.  .  .  . 

Old  Colonel  Dalhousie  did  not  deal  in  moral  subtleties,  that 
was  clear.  Regret,  penitence,  sufferings,  tears,  or  dreamy  aspira 
tion  :  he  did  not  stay  to  split  such  hairs  as  these.  His  eye  was  for 
the  large,  the  stark  effect.  And  by  the  intense  singleness  of  his 
vision,  he  had  freighted  his  opinions  with  an  extraordinary  convic- 

427 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

tion.  He  had  shouted  down,  as  from  a  high  bench,  the  world's 
judgment  on  the  life  of  Cally  Heth. 

Twenty-four  years  and  over  she  had  lived  in  this  town;  and  at 
the  end  to  be  called  a  she-devil  and  a  hell-cat. 

The  girl's  bosom  heaved.  She  became  intensely  busy  in  the 
bedroom,  by  dint  of  some  determination;  taking  off  her  street 
things  and  putting  them  painstakingly  away,  straightening 
objects  here  or  there  which  did  very  well  as  they  were.  Flora 
knocked,  and  was  sent  away.  On  the  mantel  was  discovered  a 
square  lavender  box,  bearing  a  blazoned  name  well  known  in 
another  city.  Fresh  flowers  from  Canning,  these  were;  and  Car 
lisle,  removing  the  purple  tinsel  from  the  bound  stems,  carefully 
disposed  the  blossoms  in  a  bowl  of  water.  Once  in  her  goings  and 
comings,  she  encountered  her  reflection  in  the  mirror,  and  then 
she  quickly  averted  her  eyes.  One  glance  of  recognition  between 
herself  and  that  poor  frightened  little  thing,  and  down  would 
come  the  flood-gates,  with  profitless  explanations  to  follow  in 
a  certain  quarter.  She  avoided  that  catastrophe;  but  not  so 
easily  did  she  elude 'the  echoing  words  of  her  neighbor  the 
Colonel,  which  were  like  to  take  on  the  inflection  of  an  epi 
taph.  .  .  . 

After  a  time,  when  the  dread  of  weeping  had  waned,  Cally 
threw  herself  down  in  her  chaise-longue  near  the  window,  and 
covered  her  eyes  with  her  hand.  And  now  with  all  her  will  — 
and  she  had  never  lacked  for  will  —  she  strove  to  take  her  mind 
from  what  no  piety  or  wit  could  now  amend :  struggling  to  think 
and  remember  how  she  had  tried  once,  at  a  price,  to  set  right 
that  wrong  she  had  done.  For  other  comfort  there  was  none: 
what  she  had  written,  she  had  written.  She  might  give  her 
life  to  the  ways  of  Dorcas;  she  might  beat  her  breast  and  fill  her 
hands  with  pluckings  of  her  gay  hair.  But  she  could  not  bring 
Dalhousie  back  to  life  now,  or  face  his  poor  father  as  a  girl  who 
had  done  no  wrong.  .  .  . 

Life  in  the  House  moved  on.  There  was  a  caller  or  two,  who 
found  the  ladies  excused;  there  was  a  telephone  summons  from 
Miss  Evelyn  McVey,  whose  desire  it  was  to  entertain  Mr.  Can- 

428 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


ning  at  dinner,  but  who  now  met  only  with  a  maid's  message; 
and  then,  toward  seven,  there  came  mamma  herself,  who  was, 
of  course,  not  so  lightly  to  be  disposed  of. 

But  Cally  had  fortified  herself  for  the  little  visit,  and  passed 
the  inspection  without  mishap.  Mrs.  Heth  was  acquiescent 
enough  in  her  daughter's  desire  to  dine  upstairs,  which  saved  the 
bother  of  hunting  up  another  man  in  Hugo's  stead,  though 
involving  regrettable  waste  of  two  covers  already  prepared. 
Mamma  lingered  for  fifteen  minutes  making  arch,  tactful  inqui 
ries  about  the  afternoon;  but  she  noticed  nothing  more  than  was 
accountable  for  by  the  slight  headache  to  which  Carlisle  frankly 
admitted.  The  little  general's  side  remarks  conceded  no  doubt 
whatever  that  Hugo  would  present  himself  very  shortly  indeed 
after  dinner,  for  resumption  of  the  agreeable  matter  in  hand. 
They  should  have  the  library  to  themselves,  she  promised, 
company  or  no  company.  .  .  . 

Cally  dined  at  a  reading-table,  set  by  the  fire.  Later,  when 
the  tray  was  gone  and  she  was  alone  again,  she  relapsed  into 
thoughts  which  had  gained  unwonted  lucidity  and  vigor. 

She  had  been  thinking  of  the  night,  a  year  ago  this  month,  to 
which  everything  in  her  life  since  seemed  to  run  straight  back. 
She  had  not  certainly  calculated  the  ruin  of  Dalhousie  that  night : 
rather  her  lack  was  that  she  had  hardly  cared  what  she  did  to  him. 
In  that  narrow  circle  of  engrossments  where  she  had  moved,  mis 
taking  it  for  the  living  universe,  the  great  want,  so  it  seemed 
now,  was  that  she  had  never  been  asked  to  measure  herself  by 
moral  standards  at  all.  What  she  got:  this  was  all  that  people 
looked  at  here,  and  according  to  this  she  had  well  managed  her 
affairs,  snug  in  the  snugness  of  the  horse-leech's  daughters.  She 
had  been  all  for  the  walled  little  island,  —  as  she  had  heard  it 
called,  —  the  island  of  the  upward  bound,  where  self-propelment 
was  the  test  of  right  or  wrong,  and  a  marriage  well  above  her 
the  touchstone  of  a  girl's  sound  morality.  On  this  island  such 
as  Jack  Dalhousie  had  no  merit.  What  simpler  than  to  kick  him 
off,  and  turn  away  with  your  fingers  in  your  ears?  .  .  . 

Improbable  people  these,  no  doubt,  if  you  were  of  those  who 
judged  people  by  what  they  did,  and  never  by  what  they  had; 

429 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

hell-cats,  perhaps,  if  you  happened  to  be  a  father  thus  made  son- 
less.  .  .  . 

Her  abasement  now  fairly  met  the  portrait  of  her  sketched  by 
a  stranger  two  hours  since;  outran  what  another  stranger  had 
said  to  her,  one  night  in  a  summer-house.  She  looked  back  over  a 
year,  and  seemed  to  see  herself  as  truly  one  empty  within,  a 
poor  little  thing;  common  in  her  whole  outlook,  vulgar  in  her 
soul.  .  .  .  Yes,  vulgar.  Let  her  hug  the  hateful  word  to  her 
bosom.  How  else  could  she  have  been  made  to  feel  so  again  and 
again,  by  an  obscure  youth  who  had  no  power  over  anybody 
but  that  he  had  kept  his  own  face  turned  toward  the  stars?  .  .  . 

And  when  Cally's  thoughts  turned  toward  this  present, 
struggling  to  show  beyond  doubt  that  that  girl  and  this  were 
not  one,  they  ran  perpetually  into  that  new  cloud  of  her  own 
weakness  which  had  unrolled  above  her  to-day,  and  now  spread 
and  blackened  over  the  skies. 

And  yet  she  felt  that  it  was  not  cowardice  that  tied  her  hands 
against  the  fainting  girls  in  the  bunching-room.  Her  strung 
nerves  had  carried  it  all  deeper  than  that.  She  had  spied  on  her 
father,  found  him  out  in  guilt;  he,  it  seemed,  must  for  years  have 
been  leading  a  double  life  that  would  not  bear  looking  at.  How 
bring  herself  to  confront  papa,  who  had  always  been  so  affection 
ate  and  generous  to  her,  with  his  discovered  secret?  .  .  . 

If  she  but  had  some  right,  even,  some  standing  from  which  to 
speak.  .  .  .  And  here  her  new  resolve  was  that  when  she  saw 
Dr.  Vivian  at  the  Settlement  next  week,  she  would  consult  him 
directly:  now  asking  him  to  say,  not  that  she  had  no  responsi 
bilities  about  her  father's  business,  but  that  she  had  them  in 
abundance. 

But  deeper  than  this,  beneath  all  the  flutterings  of  her  mind, 
there  ran  the  increasing  sense  that,  whatever  the  logic  of  it  might 
be,  responsibility  was  on  her  nevertheless:  the  supreme  responsi 
bility  put  upon  free  beings  by  the  trust  of  a  friend.  .  .  . 

Hugo,  it  was  presumable,  would  be  detained  with  his  Mr. 
Deming  until  the  latter's  departure,  or  near  it.  He  could  hardly 
appear  before  nine  o'clock,  or  even  nine- thirty;  and  perhaps  he 

430 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

might  not  come  at  all.  Cally  had  felt  unable  to  agree  with  her 
mother's  theory  that  she  was  required  to  sit  awaiting  Hugo's  con 
venience  there.  At  all  events,  she  had  early  resolved  to  settle  the 
point  by  definitely  "retiring"  before  his  possible  arrival;  relying 
upon  a  worse  aching  head  to  justify  her  with  mamma,  who  was 
not  of  the  few  to  be  favored  with  fuller  confidences. 

But  a  little  after  eight,  when  this  resolve  was  almost  ready 
to  shape  into  the  deed,  the  sensible  reasoning  on  which  it  was 
based  was  suddenly  upset.  The  maid  Flora  came,  bringing  a  new 
message  from  the  preoccupied  lover,  brief  but  decisive. 

The  business  entanglements,  it  appeared,  had  only  got  worse 
with  talking.  Hugo,  beyond  all  expectation,  found  himself  com 
pelled  to  go  back  to  Washington  with  his  law-partner  to-night; 
possibly  to  go  on  to  New  York  to-morrow.  Would  Carlisle  ac 
cordingly  arrange  to  see  him  now,  for  a  few  moments? 


"Yas'm,  he  say  as  soon  as  you  c'd  make  it  convenient." 

The  girl  had  risen  sharply  in  the  first  complete  surprise  of 
Flora's  message;  she  walked  hastily  across  her  floor.  But  having 
done  these  things,  she  did  not  at  once  give  the  obviously  due 
reply.  She  stood  by  her  dressing-table,  staring  fixedly  at  the  col 
ored  woman,  the  aimless  fingers  of  her  left  hand  continually 
pulling  out  and  putting  back  the  silver  top  of  a  squat  cut-glass 
bottle.  She  appeared  to  be  thinking,  weighing  pros  and  cons: 
processes  surely  unnecessary  to  a  pasteboard  actor,  sliding 
smoothly  toward  a  manifest  destiny. 

She  stood  this  way  so  long  and  so  silent  that  Flora  prompted 
with  a  giggle  and  further  information. 

"  Miss  Cyahlile,  he  say  if  you  was  to  answer  no,  to  say  could  he 
please  speak  to  you  a  minute  on  the  'phone." 

Upon  that  Miss  Carlisle  was  seen  to  replace  the  bottle  stopper 
with  consciousness  of  movement,  and  to  turn  her  slate-blue  eyes 
briefly  toward  the  ceiling,  with  no  movement  of  her  head  at  all. 

"Very  well  .  .  .  Say  that  I'll  see  him  at  half  -past  eight,  for  a 
few  minutes." 

Flora,  naturally,  was  not  a  woman  without  understanding  the 
sign  language  of  her  sex.  It  might  be  that  she  had  learned  the 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


color  of  the  Canning  money  —  and  she  had  —  but  her  dusky 
heart,  like  yours  or  mine,  was  not  for  sale. 

"Yas'm —  certny  .  .  .  Yas'm.  Or,  Miss  Cyahlile  —  I  mout 
just  say  we  're  mighty  sorry  —  but  not  knowin'  he  was  expected, 
and  you  feehV  po'ly  an'  all  —  you  just  this  minute  went  to  baid 
—  an'—" 

"No!  —  do  as  I  say,"  said  the  young  mistress,  quite  sharply. 
But,  as  her  faithful  friend  turned  away,  she  added  in  another 
voice:  "You're  a  good  girl,  Flora.  ...  Be  sure  to  say  just  for  a 
few  minutes." 

After  the  solitude  and  meditation  came  action  at  speed. 

The  maid  vanished,  the  mistress  slipped  off  her  flowered  neg- 
lig£e  and  drew  hot  water  in  the  bathroom.  She  proceeded,  with  no 
want  of  experience  or  skill,  to  make  herself  beautiful  for  her  lover: 
the  lover  who  had  seemed  over  a  gulf  from  her  this  afternoon, 
and  now  what  worlds  away.  .  .  .  And  if  the  rites  were  done  some 
what  hurriedly  perforce,  there  was  no  lack  of  conscientiousness 
here.  She,  who  had  said  that  she  had  never  paid  her  way  through 
life,  could  only  pay  in  what  coin  she  had.  .  .  . 

Events  moved  quickly.  Flora,  who  was  "on  the  doorbell" 
to-night  because  of  the  dinner-party,  was  soon  back  to  say  that 
Mr.  Canning  was  in  the  library.  She  was  sent  ahead  to  make 
sure  that  the  coast  was  clear. 

Cally,  in  a  soft  black  house-dress  with  an  apricot  waist-ribbon, 
went  down  the  back-stairs.  She  passed  through  the  busy  pantry, 
where  Moses  and  Annie  were  just  ready  for  an  expert  entrance 
with  the  fish;  went  through  the  back  hall,  where  Flora  stood  flash 
ing  her  teeth  beside  the  closed  door  of  the  dining-room;  came  to 
the  side  door  of  the  library.  This  door  Cally  opened,  and  shut  it 
again  behind  her.  .  .  . 

It  was  a  massive  and  dark-beamed  room,  softened  now  with 
the  light  of  lamps  and  fire.  Hugo  stood  in  the  middle  of  it,  turning 
quickly  at  the  sound  of  the  door.  He,  whose  afternoon  had  taken 
a  course  so  different  from  his  planning,  still  wore  the  clothes  he 
had  had  on  then,  a  dark  gray  walking-suit  which  well  became  his 
fine-figured  masculinity.  Over  his  brow  there  hovered  a  vexed 
business  frown,  nor  did  this  altogether  vanish  as  he  advanced 

432 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


upon  Carlisle,  a  lover's  welcome  springing  imperiously  into  his 
eyes. 

"Is  n't  this  the  deil's  own  luck?  .  .  .  Deming  insists  it  all  de 
pends  on  me." 

"You  go  at  nine-thirty?" 

"He  says  he'll  manacle  me  if  necessary.  It's  confoundedly 
important,  you  see  —  there  are  large  interests  involved.  You 
know  I  would  n't  go  otherwise.  Don't  you?" 

"And  to-morrow  you  go  on  to  New  York?" 

"No!  —  There's  only  the  remotest  chance.  I'll  go  bail  to  be 
back  here  to-morrow  at  five  o'clock." 

"Oh!  ...   I  —  the  message  I  got  — " 

"I  put  that  in  only  to  make  absolutely  sure  of  getting  you.  .  .  . 
Growing  cunning,  you  see." 

"Oh  —  I  did  n't  understand,"  said  Cally,  colorlessly,  continu 
ing  to  look  down  at  her  pink  fingernails. 

She  seemed  to  think  of  nothing  further  to  say,  but  that  ap 
peared  to  make  no  great  difference.  Hugo  moved  nearer.  If  he 
had  remembered  his  thought  about  her  being  too  sure  of  him,  it 
may  be  that  the  sight  of  her  had  rushed  his  senses,  as  it  had  often 
done  before. 

"You  were  so  unlike  your  natural  dear  self  this  afternoon," 
he  said,  on  the  wooing  note;  and  suddenly  he  had  possessed  him 
self  of  both  her  hands.  "To-night  —  and  we've  only  such  a 
little  time  —  you  are  going  to  make  it  all  up  to  me  ...  Are  n't 
you?" 

Finding  herself  captured,  the  girl  hastily  raised  eyes  dark  with 
trouble,  looking  at  her  lover  for  the  first  time.  And  so  looking,  she 
took  her  hands  from  his  grasp  with  a  hastiness  which  might  have 
been  a  little  rasping  to  a  morbidly  sensitive  man. 

"  Don't !  —  please  don't !  I  —  don't  like  to  be  touched I  — 

I  can  only  act  as  I  feel,  Hugo." 

She  turned  away  hurriedly,  passed  him  and  went  over  to  the 
fireplace.  There  she  stood  quite  silent  before  the  dull  red  glow, 
locking  and  unlocking  her  slim  fingers,  and  within  her  a  spreading 
coldness. 

Behind  her  she  heard  the  thundering  feet. 

433 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"I  hoped,  you  see,"  said  Hugo's  voice,  disappointed,  but 
hardly  chagrined,  "that  you  would  be  feeling  a  little  more  — 
well,  like  your  own  natural  self,  after  your  rest  .  .  .  Particularly 
as  all  our  plans  for  these  two  days  have  been  so  upset." 

She  replied,  after  a  pause,  in  a  noticeably  constrained  voice: 
"I  have  n't  said  that  I  don't  feel  my  natural  self.  That's  only 
your  —  your  interpretation  of  what  you  don't  like.  ...  I  —  that 
seems  to  be  just  the  trouble  between  us." 

"Now,  now!  —  my  dear  Cally!"  said  Hugo,  soothing,  if  some 
what  wearied  to  see  still  another  conversation  drifting  toward  the 
argumentative.  "  There 's  no  trouble  between  us  at  all.  I,  for  one, 
have  put  our  little  disagreement  to-day  out  of  my  head  entirely. 
I  do  feel  that  there 's  not  much  happiness  in  these  so-called  mod 
ernisms,  but  don't  let's  spoil  our  few  minutes.  .  .  .  Why,  Car 
lisle!"  said  Hugo,  in  another  voice.  "Why,  what's  the  matter?" 

She  had  astonished  him  by  suddenly  laying  her  arm  upon  the 
mantel,  and  burying  her  face  in  the  curve  of  it.  So  close  Canning 
stood  now  that  he  could  have  taken  her  in  his  arms  without 
moving;  but  some  quality  in  her  pose  discouraged  the  idea  that 
she  might  desire  comfort  that  way. 

Carlisle's  difficulties,  indeed,  were  by  no  means  over  for  the 
day.  The  conviction  which  had  come  upon  her  with  the  first  full 
view  of  her  lover's  face  —  where  Colonel  Dalhousie  seemed  also 
to  have  set  his  afflicting  mark  —  had  suddenly  grown  over 
whelming.  She  had  made  her  draft  for  payment  against  an  ac 
count  where  there  were  no  more  funds. 

"Are  you  ill?" 

"No,"  she  answered,  straightening  at  once.  ...  "I  ...  I'm 
afraid  —  this  is  my  natural  self." 

"Something  troubles  you?"  said  Hugo,  with  penetration. 

She  nodded,  and  turned  away. 

She  had  always  been  capable  of  independent  action;  it  was  her 
chief  strength,  however  mamma  might  speak  of  flare-ups.  But 
never  in  her  womanhood  had  she  felt  less  in  tune  for  heroics  and 
a  scene.  Life  was  shaking  to  pieces  all  around  her. 

"  Hugo,"  she  began,  with  difficulty,  playing  at  arranging  a  slide 
of  books  on  the  table  with  hands  like  two  blocks  of  ice  ...  "I  — 

434 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


I  hesitated  about  coining  down  at  all,  but  now  —  I  think  ...  As 
you  are  going  away  to-night,  and  would  be  coming  back  to 
morrow  entirely  on  my  account  ...  I  think  I  ought  — " 

"Why,  my  dear!  What's  all  this  about?  ...  Do  you  mean 
you've  let  your  feelings  be  hurt  by  my  going  off?  Why,  you  — " 

"It  is  n't  that." 

The  nature  of  his  understanding  seemed  to  stir  something  in 
her,  and  she  went  on  in  a  rather  steadier  voice: 

"I've  been  thinking  of  something  you  said  to  me  once  —  that 
I  was  n't  the  girl  you  had  asked  to  marry  you  ...  It's  taken  me 
a  long  time,  but  I've  learned  that  that  was  the  truth.  I'm 
not—" 

She  was  checked,  to  her  surprise,  by  a  soft  laugh. 

"So  that's  been  it!  ...  I  never  imagined  —  no  wonder!  .  .  . 
Why,  Cally!  How  could  you  suppose  I  meant  it?  Don't  you 
know  I  was  angry  that  day?  —  off  my  head?  Would  I — " 

"But  it's  true!  I'm  not  that  girl  at  all  —  I  feel  differently  — 
I—" 

"  Well !  Let 's  not  waste  good  time  in  mare's  nests  of  that  sort. 
Why,  dear  little  girl,  would  I  be  here  now,  if  I  was  n't  satisfied 
as  no  other  man  on  earth  — " 

"But  I'm  not  satisfied,  Hugo." 

Cally  turned  now,  faced  him  fully,  a  faint  color  coming  into 
her  cheek.  In  the  man's  handsome  eyes  she  had  surprised  an 
unmistakable  complacence. 

"I'm  not  satisfied,"  she  said,  hurriedly,  "to  know  that  we  are 
miles  apart,  and  drifting  further  every  minute.  Don't  you  see 
there 's  no  sympathy  —  no  understanding  —  between  us?  What 
interests  me,  appeals  to  me,  what  is  really  my  natural  self  — • 
that  only  annoys  you,  makes  you  think  — " 

"I've  been  at  fault  there,  I  own,"  he  interrupted,  soothingly, 
nodding  his  head  respectfully  up  and  down.  "To  tell  the  truth, 
I  've  been  so  immensely  interested  in  you,  —  in  Carlisle  the 
woman,  —  that  I  have  n't  seemed  able  to  make  proper  allow 
ance  for  your  —  your  other  interests.  I  promise  to  turn  over  a 
new  leaf  there.  And,  on  your  side,  I  am  sure,  you  do  realize, 
Carlisle—" 

435 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Hugo,"  said  the  girl,  desperately,  "you  don't  understand  me. 
I  am  trying  to  say  that  I  can't  marry  you.  I  cannot." 

Then  the  faint  hum  of  voices  from  the  dining-room  down  the 
hall  became  quite  audible  in  the  library.  By  the  ebbing  of  color 
from  Hugo's  virile  face,  Cally  knew  that  she  had  penetrated  his 
satisfaction  at  last;  but  by  the  look  in  his  eyes  she  learned  that 
she  had  lodged  no  conviction  in  him. 

"I  hesitated  when  you  asked  me  in  September,"  said  she, 
slowly,  and  trying  her  best  to  make  her  voice  sound  firm.  "I 
should  have  made  up  my  mind  sooner  —  I  Ve  been  to  blame. 
I'm  sorry  to  — " 

He  said  in  a  slightly  hoarsened  voice:  "What  has  happened 
since  I  left  you  this  afternoon?" 

What,  indeed?  Everything  seemed  to  have  happened. 

"Something  did  happen  .  .  .  But  I  —  I  don't  think  there's 
any  use  to  talk  about  it." 

"  Tell  me  what  has  happened.  I  have  a  right  to  know." 

"  I  will,  if  you  wish  —  but  it  won't  do  any  good.  ...  I  went  out, 
to  my  cousins'.  And  at  the  door,  as  I  came  back,  I  —  I  met 
Colonel  Dalhousie.  He  stopped  me  ...  expressed  his  opinion  of 
me.  He  said  things  that  I  —  I  — " 

She  stopped  precipitately,  with  a  break  in  her  voice;  turned 
from  him. 

"Oh!  —  I  understand  .  .  .  Poor  little  girl." 

At  the  mention  of  the  name  of  ill  omen,  Canning's  strong  heart 
had  missed  a  beat.  He  had  thought  the  old  corpse  buried  past 
exhumation ;  the  sudden  rising  of  the  ghost  to  walk  had  staggered 
for  an  instant  even  his  superb  incredulities.  But  with  that  sudden 
tremulousness  of  hers,  he  was  himself  again,  or  almost,  with  a 
new  light  upon  her  whole  strange  and  unreliable  demeanor.  Small 
wonder,  after  such  an  encounter,  if  she  was  brought  to  the  verge 
of  hysteria,  her  feminine  reason  unseated,  her  mind  wandering 
mustily  over  the  forgotten  past.  .  . . 

He  tried  to  take  at  least  one  hand  in  loving  sympathy,  but 
found  that  the  matter  could  not  be  arranged. 

"The  shock  has  upset  you  —  poor  darling!  I  understand.  No 
wonder!  ..." 

436 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"No  —  I'm  not  upset  .  .  .  I  —  Hugo,  I  can't  marry  you.  I'm 
truly  sorry  —  I  Ve  tried — but  now  I  'm  quite  sure  — " 

"But  this  is  madness,"  said  Hugo's  queer  voice.  "Don't  you 
see  it  is  as  you  say  the  words?  .  .  .  Not  marry  me  —  because  an 
old  ruffian  waylaid  you,  called  you  —  hard  names  — " 

"No,  but  because  what  he  said  was  true.  No  —  of  course 
that's  not  the  reason  ...  I  must  tell  you  the  truth  ..." 

Cally  lifted  misty  eyes,  beneath  which  faint  circles  were  begin 
ning  to  appear,  and  said  with  sadness: 

"Hugo,  I  don't  love  you." 

Then  she  watched,  painfully,  the  last  remnants  of  his  assurance 
drop  away  from  his  face:  and  after  that,  she  saw,  with  a  certain 
fear,  that  she  had  still  to  make  herself  believed. 

Hugo,  supported  not  merely  by  his  own  justifiable  confidences 
but  by  her  mother's  affirmations,  could,  indeed,  put  no  credence 
in  his  ears.  Many  explanations  were  possible  for  this  extraordin 
ary  feminine  perversity;  she  had  happened  to  mention  the  one 
explanation  that  was  not  possible. 

"You  don't  know  what  you're  saying,"  he  began,  huskily,  out 
of  the  silence.  "  You  're  not  yourself  at  all  nowadays  .  .  .  Full  of 
new  little  ideas.  You  've  taken  a  whim,  because  an  old  rascal .  .  . 
whom  I  shall  punish  as  he  deserves  — " 

"No  .  .  .  That  helped  me  to  make  up  my  mind,  perhaps.  But 
I  Ve  learned  I  've  never  loved  you  —  since  you  left  me  last  year." 

Cally  moved  away  from  Hugo,  not  caring  to  witness  the  break- 
ing-up  of  his  self-control.  She  leaned  against  the  heavy  mahog 
any  table,  clenching  a  tiny  handkerchief  between  chill  little 
hands.  If  the  months  had  brought  her  perfect  vengeance  on  the 
man  who  had  once  failed  her  in  her  need,  she  was  finding  it,  in 
deed,  a  joyless  victory. 

"  I  'm  to  blame  for  not  telling  you  before  —  when  you  were  here 
last  month,"  she  said,  with  some  agitation  .  .  .  "Only  I  really 
did  n't  know  my  own  mind  ...  All  summer  I  seemed  to  ...  just 
to  take  it  for  granted  that  —  everything  was  the  same  —  that  I 
still  cared  for  you.  But  —  Hugo,  I  don't.  I  'm  sorrier  than  I  can 
say  for  what  has  been  my  fault.  ..." 

The  young  man  had  been  standing  like  one  in  a  trancelike 

437 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

illness,  who  can  hear,  indeed,  with  horrible  distinctness,  but  can 
neither  move  nor  speak.  But  now  the  increasing  finality  of  her 
words  seemed  all  at  once  to  galvanize  him;  he  shook  himself 
slightly  and  took  one  heavy  step  forward. 

"  What  you  need  is  a  protector,  little  girl  —  a  man.  I  know 
about  the  summer  —  I  suffered,  too  ...  Of  course.  And  in  the 
loneliness  —  you've  let  yourself  be  affected  .  .  .  The  unrest  of 
the  day— " 

"No,  no!  Please"  said  she,  almost  ready  to  scream  —  "don't 
think  this  is  one  of  my  new  little  ideas  you  speak  of.  I  —  it 's 
true  that  we  don't  seem  to  think  alike  about  things  .  .  .  But  I  'd 
never  have  noticed  that  at  all  if  I  loved  you.  I  'd  want  to  think 
and  do  only  as  you  wished.  But  I  don't  — " 

"I've  spoiled  you  .  .  .  letting  you  think  you  could  have  your 
way  with  me,"  said  Hugo,  in  his  thick  and  gritty  voice.  "You're 
mad  to-night,  little  girl  .  .  .  are  n't  responsible  for  what  you 
say  .  .  ." 

Flicked  in  her  spirit,  she  broke  across  his  argument  with  a 
changed  voice  and  gaze. 

"  Why  is  it  madness  not  to  love  you?  " 

"It's  not  a  thing  to  argue  about  now,  I  say.  You  do  love 
me  ...  I  know  it.  You'll  marry  me  next  month,  that  I  swear. 
Why—" 

"No!  —  when  I  love,  I  want  to  look  up,  and  when  I  marry, 
I'll  marry  above  me  ..." 

That  checked  his  queer  truculence;  and  Cally,  desperate  with 
the  need  to  drive  home  her  meaning,  swept  on  with  no  more 
nervousness. 

"  And  —  don't  you  see?  —  I  've  not  been  able  to  look  up  to  you 
since  that  day  last  year  .  .  .  The  day  —  I  'm  sorry  to  have  to 
say  it  —  when  you  came  all  the  way  down  from  New  York  to 
show  me  that  you  did  n't  care  for  a  woman  who  was  getting  new 
little  ideas  about  telling  the  truth.  .  .  ." 

Canning's  face  was  the  color  of  chalk,  his  look  increasingly 
stony;  iiThis  eyes  strange  passions  mounted.  Now  he  seemed 
to  intend  to  say  something,  but  the  girl's  words  flowed  with 
gathering  intensity. 

438 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Why,  think  what  you  did  that  day.,  Hugo!  — think,  think! 
If  I  needed  a  protector  and  a  man,  —  and  I  did,  —  that  was  the 
time  for  you  to  show  me  how  protectors  and  men  can  act  and 
love.  If  I  was  wrong,  it  seems  to  me  that  was  the  time  of  all  times 
when  you  ought  to  have  stood  by  me,  protected  me.  But  I  was 
right  —  don't  you  know  I  was?  ...  I  —  it  was  the  first  time  I 
had  ever  thought  about  doing  right  —  and  you  threw  me  over  for 
it.  ...  Of  course  I  know  there  was  a  quarrel,  but  —  you  know 
perfectly  well  what  you  said.  You  said  then,  just  as  you  say  now, 
that  I  was  shocked  out  of  my  senses,  did  n't  know  what  I  was 
saying.  And  then  you  said  that  people  would  point  at  me  to  the 
longest  day  I  lived,  so  the  thing  to  do  was  to  hush  it  all  up,  or 
else  I  was  n't  the  girl  you  had  asked  to  be  your  wife.  Anything  — 
anything  —  except  that  I  should  tell  the  truth  ...  So  you  went 
off  and  left  me  to  bear  it  all  alone.  And  then,  when  my  heart  had 
been  broken  into  little  pieces,  when  I'd  cried  my  eyes  out  a  hun 
dred  times,  then,  when  all  the  trouble  was  over,  and  people 
were  n't  cutting  me  on  the  street,  —  then  you  came  back.  And 
even  then  you  never  said  once  that  you  were  ashamed,  or  sorry 
for  the  way  you'd  treated  me.  You  just  came  back,  when  I'd 
fought  it  all  out  without  you,  and  whistled,  and  thought  that  I  'd 
tumble  into  your  arms.  .  .  .  Oh,  it's  natural,  I  suppose,  for  a 
woman  to  lie  and  be  mean,  and  afraid  of  what  people  will  say  — 
for  that  seems  to  be  the  —  the  way  they're  brought  up  ...  But 
—  but--" 

Her  voice,  which  had  begun  to  trail  a  little,  dropped  off  into 
silence.  She  turned  away;  made  a  visible  effort  to  control  herself. 
And  then  there  floated  again  into  the  still  room  the  sounds  of  muf 
fled  revelry:  strong  Mrs.  Heth  making  merry  with  her  friends,  a 
few  of  the  best  people.  .  .  . 

"But  I  only  hurt  your  feelings  for  nothing,"  said  the  girl,  in 
quite  a  gentle  voice.  .  .  .  "Hugo,  try  to  forgive  me  if  I've  done 
you  any  wrong.  But  .  .  .  you  —  you  have  your  train  to  make. 
Don't  you  think  you'd  better  go  now?" 

Hugo's  extraordinary  reply  was  to  seize  her  in  his  arms. 

"Go?  .  .  .  Yes,  and  take  you  with  me  ...  you  little  witch. 
Why,  you're  raving,  little  witch,"  said  the  hoarse,  violent  voice 

439 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


in  her  ear.  "Gone  out  of  your  head  with  notions.  ...  D'you 
think  I'll  let  your  life  and  mine  be  spoiled  for  a  few  minutes' 
crazy  madness?  You  need  to  remember  you're  a  woman,  that's 
all ...  Don't  struggle.  It 's  no  use." 

Her  wild  efforts  to  release  herself,  indeed,  only  drew  his 
embrace  tighter.  His  cheek  rested  upon  her  hair. 

"Don't  struggle,  little  witch.  You've  had  your  head  too  long. 
I  '11  make  up  your  mind  for  you.  You  're  going  to  marry  me  now. 
To-night.  Don't  tire  yourself  so.  It 's  all  settled.  You  belong  to 
me  —  you  see  that  now,  don't  you?  ..." 

Now  his  hand  was  beneath  her  chin;  he  raised  the  still  face  she 
had  kept  so  resolutely  buried  against  his  breast.  And  Cally  felt 
his  burning  kiss  upon  her  forehead,  her  cheek,  upon  lips  that 
would  nevermore  be  his. 

"Little  temptress  .  .  .  you  were  so  anxious  for  me  to  love  you 
last  year.  .  .  .  Does  n't  this  teach  you  that  I  '11  never  give  you 
up?  It's  all  settled  now.  We '11  be  married  at  once.  I '11  hold 
you  this  way  —  kiss  you  this  way  —  till  you  learn  to  do  what  I 
say.  Then  you'll  go  up  and  put  on  travelling-clothes.  Never 
mind  lug  .  .  ." 

His  wedding-trip  ended  in  the  middle  of  a  word.  His  clasp  had 
been  weakened  by  that  hand  he  had  raised,  and  with  the  sudden 
strength  of  desperation  his  bride  had  broken  from  him.  In  an 
instant  she  had  put  the  table  between  them. 

Over  ten  feet  of  lamplit  space,  the  lovers  of  yesteryear  re 
garded  each  other.  Both  were  white,  both  trembling.  The 
girl  now  suffered  a  brief  collapse;  her  face  dropped  into  her 
upraised  hands,  through  which,  presently,  her  voice  came  bro 
kenly: 

"Go /...Go,  I  beg  you..." 

Canning  stood  panting,  shaken  and  speechless.  Upon  him  was 
the  last  measure  of  defeat.  He  had  staked  his  passion  and  his 
pride  in  the  supreme  attack,  and  had  been  crushingly  repulsed. 
Doubt  not  that  he  read  the  incredible  portents  in  the  heavens 
now.  His  face  went  from  chalk  to  leaden  gray. 

He  drew  his  tongue  once  across  his  lips,  and  said,  just  articu 
lately: 

440 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"If  I  go  —  out  of  this  room  —  alone  ...  as  God  lives,  you'll 
never  see  me  again." 

It  must  have  been  something  in  Hugo's  difficult  voice,  surely 
nothing  in  the  words,  that  set  a  chord  to  stirring  in  Cally.  She 
took  her  eyes  from  her  hands,  glanced  once  at  his  subtly  distorted 
face.  And  then  she  stood  silent  by  the  barrier  table,  looking 
down,  knotting  and  unknotting  her  yellow  sash-ends.  .  .  . 

That  other  night  of  humiliation  in  the  library,  which  she  had 
never  been  able  to  forget,  had  risen  swiftly  on  the  wings  of 
memory.  But,  curiously,  she  felt  no  such  uprush  of  shame  now; 
her  fury  mysteriously  ebbed  from  her.  Even  in  this  moment, 
still  trembling  from  his  familiar  handling,  still  with  the  frighten 
ing  sense  of  her  life  going  to  ruin  about  her,  she  felt  a  rising  pity 
for  her  prince  of  lovers  whom  time  and  circumstance  had  brought 
to  this.  .  .  . 

"  Perhaps,"  said  she,  out  of  the  silence,  in  almost  a  natural  tone, 
"I  ought  to  feel  very  —  angry  and  —  and  indignant  .  .  .  But  I 
don't.  I  only  feel  sad  .  .  .  Hugo,  why  need  there  be  any  bitter 
ness  between  us?  We've  both  made  a  mistake,  that's  all,  and  I 
feel  it's  been  my  fault  from  the  beginning.  If  you  seem  to  take 
me  —  rather  —  lightly  ...  I  must  have  taught  you  to  think  of 
me  that  way  .  .  .  And  you  '11  soon  see  how  —  how  superficial  my 
attraction  for  you  was,  soon  forget  .  .  ." 

Strangely,  these  mild  words  seemed  to  affect  Hugo  more  than 
anything  done  or  said  before.  In  fact,  he  appeared  unable  to 
bear  them.  He  had  checked  her  speech  suddenly  by  lifting  his 
hand,  in  a  vague  way,  to  his  head;  and  now,  without  a  word,  he 
turned  away,  walking  blindly  toward  the  door. 

She,  in  silence,  followed  his  going  with  dark  eyes  that  looked 
half  ready  to  weep. 

By  the  door  into  the  hall,  through  which  she  had  come  a  little 
while  before,  the  broken  young  man  paused.  His  face  was  stony 
gray,  touched  with  livid  streaks.  Standing,  he  looked  unseeingly 
about  the  room,  around  and  over  her;  then  at  last  at  her.  It 
had  seemed  to  be  his  intention  to  say  something,  to  claim  the 
woman's  privilege  of  the  last  word.  But  now,  when  the  moment 
arrived,  there  came  no  words. 

441 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


For  once  Hugo  must  be  indifferent  to  anti-climax,  must  fail  to 
leave  a  lady's  presence  with  an  air.  Standing  and  looking,  he 
suddenly  flung  out  one  arm  in  a  wild,  curious  gesture;  and  on 
that  he  opened  the  door,  very  quickly. 

The  door  shut  again,  quietly  enough.  And  that  was  all.  The 
beginning  at  the  Beach  had  touched  an  end  indeed.  Hugo  was 
gone.  His  feet  would  thunder  this  way  no  more. 

But  the  latter  end  of  these  things  was  not  yet.  One  does  n't,  of 
course,  kick  out  of  one's  groove  for  nothing. 

Cally,  returning  after  a  time  to  her  own  room,  did  not  go  at 
once  to  bed,  much  as  she  would  have  liked  to  do  that.  She  sat 
up,  fully  dressed,  by  a  dying  fire,  waiting  for  what  must  come. 
She  waited  till  quarter  to  eleven,  so  long  did  the  dinner-guests 
linger  downstairs.  But  it  came  at  last,  just  as  she  had  known  it 
would:  on  gliding  heels,  not  knocking,  beaming  just  at  first.  .  .  . 

The  interview  lasted  till  hard  upon  midnight.  When  it  ended, 
both  women  were  in  tears.  Cally  retired  to  a  fitful  rest.  At  nine 
o'clock  next  morning,  papa  telephoned  for  Dr.  Halstead,  who 
came  and  found  temperature,  and  prescribed  a  pale-green  medi 
cine,  which  was  to  be  shaken  well  before  using.  The  positive 
command  was  that  the  patient  should  not  get  out  of  bed  that 
day. 

And  Cally  did  not  get  up  that  day,  or  the  next,  or  the  next.  She 
lay  abed,  pale  and  uncommunicative,  denying  herself  even  to 
Mattie  Allen,  but  less  easily  shutting  herself  from  the  operations 
of  her  mind. 

And  at  night,  when  the  troubled  brain  slips  all  control,  she 
dreamed  continually  of  horrors.  Horrors  in  which  neither  Hugo 
nor  mamma  had  part :  of  giant  machines  crashing  through  floors 
upon  screaming  girls,  of  great  crowded  buildings  falling  down  with 
frightful  uproars  and  bedlam  shrieks.  Through  these  phantasms 
the  tall  figure  of  Colonel  Dalhousie  perpetually  moved,  smiling 
softly.  But  when  Cally  met  the  doctor  of  the  Dabney  House  in 
her  dreams,  the  trust  was  gone  from  his  eyes. 


XXXI 

Second  Cataclysm  in  the  House ;  of  the  Dark  Cloud  obscuring  the 
New  Day,  and  the  Violets  that  had  faded  behind  a  Curtain, 
etc.;  but  chiefly  of  a  Little  Talk  with  Mamma,  which  produced 
Moral  Results,  after  all. 

THE  foolish  nightmares  receded;  the  sad  faces  of  a  dream 
dwindled  again  into  air;  and  she  waked  suddenly  in  the 
sunshine  to  find  herself  quite  well.  This  she  knew  with 
the  first  opening  of  her  eyes.  The  familiar  objects  in  the  room,  the 
face  of  the  morning,  wore  the  unmistakable  well  look.  Wellness 
there  seemed  within,  too,  refreshment  in  body,  mind,  and  spirit. 
Life  called  to  the  young  and  the  strong,  and  the  sunlight,  stream 
ing  royally  through  the  shuttered  windows,  was  the  ringing 
reveille  of  a  new  day.  .  .  . 

But  Cally  Heth,  having  waked  to  life,  lay  on  in  bed.  She  heard 
the  summons,  was  strong  to  answer  it ;  but  was  held  back  as  by  a 
high  surrounding  wall.  She  was  like  a  tied  bird,  unfolding  wings 
with  the  heart  to  soar,  and  continually  brought  down  by  the 
shortness  of  her  tether. 

She  had  waked  to  overspreading  gloom  in  the  House  of  Heth; 
but  this  she  could  have  fronted  cheerfully  to-day,  fortified  to 
charm  it  away,  for  herself  and  others.  If  events  of  late  had  been 
sweeping  her  along  too  fast,  one  emotion  crowded  unsteadyingly 
upon  another,  nature,  stepping  in,  had  put  the  gentle  punctua 
tion  where  it  was  needed.  Hers  was  the  resilience  of  youth.  And 
the  second  cataclysm  in  the  House,  even  at  its  worst  (which  was 
what  mamma  had  made  it),  was  hardly  comparable  to  the  first. 
There  was  no  spiritual  abasement  this  time,  no  sense  of  calamity 
and  worlds  at  end.  Rather,  indeed,  the  contrary:  and  it  was  here 
that  was  found  the  seriousness  of  it  all,  in  that  now  the  smash-up 
was  her  own  deliberate  doing.  Cally  had  hardly  needed  her 
mother's  savage  outbreak  to  make  her  feel  how  definite  a  part- 

443 


V.    V. 's      Eyes 

ing  was  here  with  the  ideals  and  aspirations  of  a  lifetime.  She 
saw  that  one  whole  phase  of  her  girlhood  had  passed  away  for 
ever.  Or,  it  might  be,  this  that  she  had  said  good-bye  to  was 
the  dim  figure  of  her  girlhood  itself.  .  .  . 

In  these  thoughts  there  was  sadness,  naturally.  Hugo's  going 
had  been  with  the  noises  of  breakage,  the  reverberations  of 
the  day  of  judgment.  But  Cally  had  had  four  days  to  put  her 
house  in  order;  and  she  felt  that  she  would  have  waked  almost 
happy  to-day,  but  for  this  stranger  cloud  that  still  hung  so  dark 
upon  the  horizon.  .  .  . 

It  was  such  a  day  as  October  in  this  climate  brings  week  on 
week,  gloriously  golden.  Cally  breakfasted  in  bed.  Toward  ten 
o'clock,  as  she  was  slowly  dressing  with  the  maid's  assistance, 
word  came  that  her  mother  desired  her  presence  in  the  adminis 
trative  bedroom  below. 

"Very  well,  Annie,"  said  the  girl,  listlessly.  "I'll  be  down  in  a 
few  minutes." 

The  message  came  as  something  of  a  surprise,  though  a  dis 
ciplinary  intent  was  easily  surmised  behind  it.  In  the  interview 
the  other  night,  mamma  had  formally  washed  her  hands  of  Cally 
and  all  her  flare-ups,  more  than  intimating  that  henceforward 
they  would  live  as  comparative  strangers.  Since  then  there  had 
come  nothing  from  the  staunch  little  general,  who  also  had  re 
mained  in  her  tent,  not  ill,  but  permanently  aloof  and  unrecon 
ciled.  Very  different,  as  it  chanced,  was  the  note  struck  by  papa, 
who  had  come  twice  a  day,  and  sometimes  thrice,  to  the  sick 
room,  ostentatiously  cheery  in  his  manner,  but  obviously  de 
pressed  underneath  by  the  dreary  atmosphere  enveloping  the 
house.  Never,  it  seemed,  had  papa  been  tenderer  or  more  affec 
tionate  than  in  these  bedside  visits:  so  that  Cally,  with  her 
sense  of  a  guilty  secret,  could  hardly  bear  to  look  at  his  kind, 
worried  face. 

And  she  had  opened  her  eyes  on  the  day  of  wellness  with  the 
knowledge  that  she  must  put  her  hand  to  this  cloud  now,  though 
she  brought  down  the  skies  with  it.  Nothing,  it  was  clear,  could 
be  worse  than  this.  To-night,  after  dinner,  she  must  follow  her 
father  into  the  study,  say  what  she  must  say.  Her  mind  had 

444 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

returned  and  clung  to  the  solid  arguments  of  Hen  and  others. 
She  knew  that  the  memory  of  the  bunching-room  had  got  upon 
her  nerves;  entwined  and  darkened  itself  with  other  painful 
things;  assumed  fantastic  and  horrid  shapes.  Perhaps  the 
dreaded  interview  would  not  be  so  very  bad,  after  all.  Surely 
her  father  could  not  wear  that  kind  look  for  nothing.  .  .  . 

Dressed,  Carlisle  stood  at  her  window  a  moment,  greeting 
somewhat  sadly  the  brilliant  day.  Her  desire  was  to  stop  the 
footless  workings  of  her  mind;  to  go  out  and  do  something.  But 
all  that  she  could  think  of  to  do  was  to  return  to  Baird  &  Him- 
mePs  emporium  and  complete  that  shopping  for  the  Thompson 
kinsfolk  which  had  been  so  suddenly  interrupted  last  week. 
And,  that  occupation  exhausted,  she  would  go  on  to  Mattie 
Allen's,  and  probably  stay  there  for  luncheon.  Tame  achieve 
ments,  but  better  than  staying  longer  in  this  room. 

Here  on  the  broad  window  ledge,  behind  the  concealing  cur 
tain,  there  stood  a  bowl  of  flowers.  They  were  violets,  dry  and 
discolored  now.  The  girl's  eyes,  just  as  she  was  turning  away  to 
ward  her  mother,  fell  upon  them,  and  she  stopped,  overtaken  by 
memory.  These  were  Hugo's  flowers,  his  last  gift  to  her.  She 
herself  had  placed  them  here,  that  eventful  afternoon  five  days 
ago,  and  not  thought  of  them  again  till  this  moment.  .  .  .  Was 
that,  which  seemed  like  an  echo  from  some  previous  life,  only 
five  days  ago? 

She  stood  looking  down  at  the  mass  of  sere  bloom,  touched  the 
withered  tops  lingeringly  with  her  finger-tips.  It  was  her  tribute 
to  the  dead,  no  more.  The  departed  knight  had  dropped  back 
ward  out  of  her  heart  with  a  speed  and  smoothness  which  showed 
that  he  had,  indeed,  had  small  foothold  there  since  May.  Less 
and  less  had  Cally  felt  any  impulse  to  judge  or  blame  Hugo,  im 
pute  "badness"  to  him;  it  was  she  who  had  changed,  and  never 
he.  But  how,  why?  .  .  .  'Was  it  something  done,  something 
said?'  Strange  to  remember  now  the  hurried  journey  to  the 
Beach  last  year,  that  afternoon  in  Willie  Kerr's  apartment.  .  .  . 

"Throw  out  those  flowers  in  the  window,  Flora.  .  .  .  They've 
been  faded  for  days." 

She  went  down  the  stairs  in  that  inner  state  which  her  country 

445 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


had  once  found  unendurable:  she  was  half  slave  and  half  free. 
And  on  the  stairs  she  forgot  Hugo  entirely.  She  was  thinking,  in 
her  loneliness  and  depression,  of  Vivian,  who  had  pledged  his 
help  to  her;  wondering  if  she  could  ask  him  to  come  and  give  her 
his  help  now,  —  at  four  o'clock  this  afternoon,  perhaps,  when 
the  house  would  be  quiet  and  her  mother  napping.  Her  wish 
was  to  talk  with  him,  to  show  him  all  her  difficulty,  before  she 
saw  her  father.  She  felt  that  she  could  tell  anything  to  Mr. 
V.  V.  now.  .  .  . 

Cally  tapped  respectfully  upon  a  closed  door,  and  said 
"Mamma?"  Bidden  to  enter  by  the  strong  voice  within,  she 
braced  herself  a  little,  and  opened  the  door.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth  sat  toward  the  bay-window  of  a  spacious  bedroom, 
dignified  by  an  alcove  and  bright  but  for  the  half-drawn  shades. 
It  was  observed  that  she  wore  her  second-best  robe  de  chambre, 
and  was  otherwise  not  dressed  for  the  inspection  of  the  best 
people.  So  indifferently  was  her  fine  hair  caught  up  atop  her 
head  that  the  round  purplish  spot  on  her  temple  was  left  plainly 
visible:  always  an  ominous  sign.  .  .  . 

"Good  morning,  mamma.  I  hope  you're  feeling  better  to 
day?" 

"Physically,  I  am  quite  well,"  said  her  mother,  only  half  turn 
ing  her  head. 

"Oh,  I'm  glad.  ...  It's  such  a  beautiful  day.  I  hoped  you 
would  feel  like  going  out  for  a  drive." 

"I  hardly  feel  like  going  out  —  as  yet.  ...  Sit  down." 

Cally  sat  in  the  chair  prescribed  by  a  gesture.  The  eyes  of  the 
two  women  met  for  the  first  time  since  they  had  parted  in 
tears.  And  Cally,  seeing  her  mother's  bereaved  face,  had  to 
crush  down  a  sudden  almost  overpowering  impulse  toward  ex 
planation,  reconciliation  at  any  cost.  However,  she  did  crush  it 
down.  There  was  nothing  to  explain,  as  mamma  had  pointed  out 
in  the  midnight. 

Mrs.  Heth  cleared  her  throat,  though  her  voice  seemed  suffi 
ciently  strong. 

"I  understood  from  Flora  that  you  were  getting  up  this  morn 
ing,"  said  she,  "so  this  seemed  the  appropriate  time  for  me  to 

446 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


see  you,  and  learn  something  about  your  plans,  regarding  your 
future." 

"My  plans?" 

"  As  you  have  so  completely  overthrown  your  parents'  plans 
for  you,  I  can  only  assume  that  you  have  others  of  your  own." 

Cally  sat  with  her  hands  folded  in  her  lap.  A  look  of  curious 
wistfulness  flitted  across  her  face. 

"No,  I  have  n't  any  special  plans." 

"I'm  surprised  to  hear  you  say  so.  You  surely  do  not  expect 
to  go  on  this  way  the  rest  of  your  natural  life,  do  you?  " 

"I  don't  understand,  mamma.  Go  on  in  what  way?" 

"In  this  way.  In  occupying  the  central  position  in  my 
home,  in  allowing  your  parents  to  sacrifice  their  lives  to  you, 
in  receiving  lavish  evidences  of  regard  and  affection  which 
you  evidently  have  not  the  slightest  wish  to  return." 

There  was  a  considerable  silence. 

"I  have  a  sort  of  plan  there,"  said  the  girl,  slowly.  "I  don't 
want  you  —  and  papa  —  to  go  on  —  giving  me  everything.  I 
want,"  she  said,  with  a  slight  tremor,  "to  take  —  to  be  just  as 
little  expense  as  I  can  after  this." 

"Oh!  .  .  .Then  what  you  want  to  do  is  to  withdraw  alto 
gether  from  society  —  and  go  to  work  to  earn  your  own 
living?" 

Carlisle  raised  her  eyes.  "Is  that  what  you  want  me  to  do, 
mamma?" 

"It  is  not  a  question  of  what  /  want  in  this  house  any  longer, 
it  seems.  ...  I  am  pointing  out  to  you,  Carlisle,  that  the  in 
dependence  of  action  you  have  lately  taken  upon  yourself  is  a 
serious  matter,  to  be  looked  at  from  more  than  one  side.  It  is 
not  becoming,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  watching  her  daughter's  face 
closely,  "to  bite  the  hand  that  feeds  you." 

To  this  the  girl  had  no  reply.  Beneath  her  mother's  somewhat 
vivid  metaphor,  she  perceived  a  truth,  and  that  truth  the 
tragic  weakness  of  her  position.  But  she  did  not  know  now  that 
large  books  had  been  written  about  this  weakness,  and  many 
more  would  be.  ... 

Mrs.  Heth  having  allowed  the  silence  to  continue  a  moment, 

447 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


educationally,  drew  a  handkerchief  across  her  upper  lip,  with  its 
strange  little  downy  mustache,  and  resumed: 

"With  no  plans  of  your  own,  you  have  lately  thrown  away  the 
best  opportunity  you  will  ever  have  in  your  life.  Now  there  are 
only  two  theories  on  which  I  can  explain  this  conduct  —  so  totally 
unlike  your  usual  good  sense.  One  is  that  you  have  permitted 
yourself,  without  my  knowledge,  to  become  interested  in  some 
body  else  .  .  .  Have  you? " 

"No  —  oh,  no!  ...  No,  of  course  not." 

"That  I  felt  confident  of,"  said  mamma,  though  not  without  a 
certain  note  of  relief.  "  Confident.  .  .  .  Yet  —  to  touch  the  second 
point,  —  as  you  look  toward  the  future,  you  do  expect  to  marry 
some  day,  do  you  not?" 

The  daughter  seemed  restive  under  this  cross-examination. 
She  turned  away  from  the  maternal  scrutiny,  and,  resting  her 
arm  upon  her  chair-back,  looked  toward  the  shaded  window. 

"  Yes  —  I  suppose  so.  ...  That  seems  to  be  all  I  'm  fit  for  ... 
But  —  since  you  ask  me,  mamma  —  I  would  like,  in  the  mean 
time,  not  to  be  so  ...  so  plainly  labelled  waiting.  .  .  .  I  'd  like," 
she  said,  hesitatingly,  "  to  have  one  man  I  meet  —  see  me  in  some 
other  light  than  as  a  candidate  for  matrimony." 

"That,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  firmly,  "will  never  be,  so  long  as  you 
retain  your  youth  and  beauty,  and  men  retain  their  nature.  .  .  . 

"And  why  should  you  wish  it  otherwise?  "  continued  the  domi 
nant  little  lady.  "  Despite  all  the  loose,  unwomanly  talk  in  the 
air,  you  do  realize,  I  see,  that  marriage  will  always  remain  the 
noblest  possible  career  for  a  woman." 

Cally  remembered  a  converse  of  this  proposition  she  had  heard 
one  day  at  the  Woman's  Club.  She  answered  with  light  bitterness: 

"When  I  said  just  now  that  I  was  fit  for  marriage,  I  meant 
marriage,  mamma  —  a  wedding.  Of  course,  I  'm  not  fit  to  be 
anybody's  wife  ..."  She  paused,  and  added  in  a  voice  from 
which  the  bitterness  had  all  gone  out:  "I'm  not  fit  to  be  any 
body's  mother." 

"There,  there!"  riposted  mamma,  briskly.  "I  think  that's 
enough  of  poor  Henrietta  Cooney,  and  her  wild,  unsuccessful 
notions." 

448 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


There  was  another  brief  silence;  the  silence  of  the  death  of  talk. 

"  You're  in  a  dangerously  unsettled  state  of  mind,  my  daugh 
ter  —  dangerously.  But  you  will  find,  as  other  women  have 
found,  that  marriage  will  relieve  all  these  discontents.  I  myself," 
said  mamma,  with  a  considerable  stretching  of  the  truth,  "went 
through  the  same  stages  in  my  youth  —  though,  of  course,  I  was 
married  much  younger  than  you.  .  .  .  Now,  Carlisle,  I  have  re 
fused  to  believe  that  your  quarrel  with  Hugo  is  irreparable." 

Carlisle  started  as  if  slapped.  Had  mamma  jerked  her  by  a 
string,  she  could  not  have  turned  more  sharply.  The  lit  tie  general, 
leaning  forward,  swept  on  with  hurried  firmness. 

"I  see,  of  course,  that  you  have  taken  your  quarrel  very  seri 
ously,  very  hard.  You  feel  that  in  your  anger  you  both  said  terri 
ble  things  which  can't  possibly  be  overlooked.  But,  my  child, 
remember  that  the  course  of  true  love  never  did  run  smooth. 
There  have  been  few  engagements  which  were  n't  broken  off  at 
least  once,  few  marriages  when  the  wife  did  n't  make  up  her 
mind—" 

"Mamma! "  said  Cally,  rousing  herself  as  from  a  cataleptic 
sleep.  "  You  can't  have  understood  what  I  told  you  that  night. 
This  was  not  a  quarrel  at  all,  in  any  sense  — " 

"I  know!  I  understand!  I  withdraw  the  word  cheerfully," 
said  mamma,  in  just  that  tone  and  manner  which  made  the 
strange  similarity  between  her  and  Hugo.  "But  what  I  want  to 
say,  Cally,  is  this.  Hugo  is  still  in  Washington.  Willie  Kerr,  to 
whom  I  talked  by  telephone  last  night,  had  a  telegram  from  him 
yesterday.  Now,  my  child,  men  do  not  take  women's  angry 
speeches  quite  as  seriously  as  you  think.  Hugo  is  mad  about  you. 
All  he  wants  is  you  — " 

"Oh,  please  —  please!  Don't  say  any  more.   You  don't  —  " 

"  No,  hear  me  out !  See  for  yourself  if  my  plan  is  not  diplomatic 
and  feasible,  and  involves  no  surrender  of  pride.  I  shall  send 
Willie  Kerr  on  to  Washington  this  afternoon.  He  will  go  osten 
sibly  on  private  business  with  one  of  the  Departments,  —  though 
I  will,  of  course,  pay  all  expenses,  —  and  putting  up  at  Hugo's 
hotel,  will  meet  him  as  if  by  accident.  In  their  talk  Willie,  who  is 
tact  and  loyalty  itself,  will  perhaps  mention  your  sickness,  though 

449 


V.    V. 


Eyes 


without  comment.  Gradually  the  impression  will  come  to  Hugo 
that  if  he  returns,  with,  of  course,  suitable  apologies  — " 

"Mamma,"  said  Cally,  starting  up,  very  white,  "if  you  do 
any  such  thing  as  that  I'll  go  away  somewhere.  I  will  go  and 
earn  my  own  living  .  .  .  I'll  go  and  live  with  the  Cooneys  /" 

The  two  women  gazed  at  each  other.  Over  the  mother 's  face 
there  spread  a  slow  flush;  the  round,  purple  birthmark  darkened. 
Cally  spoke  again,  with  deadly  earnestness. 

"I  did  think  you  understood  about  this.  ...  If  you  persuade 
Hugo  to  walk  down  from  Washington  on  his  knees  ...  I  '11  not 
see  him." 

Mrs.  Heth,  curiously,  had  been  brought  down  in  full  flight: 
perhaps  by  the  force  of  that  wild  upstarting,  perhaps  by  the  grisly 
threat  about  the  Cooneys.  Carlisle  in  a  flare-up  had  always 
required  a  certain  handling.  The  worst  of  the  mad  girl  was  that 
she  was  really  capable  of  doing  these  unspeakable  things  she 
mentioned.  , 

"So  you  refuse  pointblank,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  in  a  muffled  sort 
of  voice,  "to  carry  out  your  parents'  wishes." 

"About  this  —  I  must.  I'll  do  anything  else  you  want  me  to, 
anything.  .  .  .  And,  mamma,  this  is  n't  papa's  wish,"  said  the 
girl,  with  some  emotion.  "He  told  me  —  the  other  night  —  that 
I  must  n't  think  of  marrying  anybody  I  did  n't  care  for.  He  said 
he  had  never  thought  the  same  of  Hugo  — " 

Then  mamma  smote  the  flat  arm  of  her  morris-chair,  and 
sprang  up,  exploding. 

" That's  it!  Shove  it  off  on  your  poor,  generous  father!  .  .  . 
How  characteristic  of  your  whole  behavior!  Why,  you  ought 
to  be  ashamed  to  mention  your  father's  name! "  cried  mamma; 
and,  indeed,  Cally  was,  though  for  reasons  not  known  to  her 
mother.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Heth  walked  the  floor,  in  the  grip  of  those  agonies  which 
the  defeat  of  her  will  brought  her  in  poignant  measure.  It  may 
be  that  her  faith  in  her  diplomatic  plan  had  never  been  tri 
umphantly  strong.  Now,  certainly,  her  purposes  were  punitive 
only,  and  her  flowing  sentences  well  turned  to  her  desire.  .  .  . 

"You  suppose  your  father's  overjoyed  to  have  his  delightfully 

45° 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

independent  daughter  thrown  back  on  his  hands  —  of  course!" 
she  was  remarking.  "True,  you've  heard  him  say  a  thousand 
times  that  he  was  going  to  sell  his  business  as  soon  as  you  mar 
ried  and  buy  himself  a  place  in  the  country  and  begin  to  have 
some  pleasure  of  his  own.  But,  of  course,  that  was  only  his  little 
joke!  Yes,  yes!"  said  mamma,  brandishing  her  arms.  "What 
he  really  wants  is  to  go  on  slaving  and  toiling  and  worrying  his 
heart  out  to  keep  you  in  pampered  idleness  and  luxury,  indulg 
ing  your  lightest  whim  without  regard  — " 

"Mamma,  mamma!  —  do,  please!"  the  girl  broke  in.  "If 
papa  has  been  working  so  hard  on  my  account  —  and  I  did  n't 
know  that  —  then  I  don't  want  him  to  do  it  any  more.  I  wish  he 
would  sell — " 

"  Oh,  I  've  no  patience  with  your  deathbed  repentances !  Don't 
you  know  your  father 's  involved  in  serious  worries  at  this  mo 
ment,  entirely  on  your  account?  Do  you  think  a  few  dramatic 
speeches  from  you  can  undo  — " 

"  Worries  on  my  account?  No,  I  did  n't  know  of  any  .  .  .  What 
worries?" 

Cally  had  stood  listening  with  a  kind  of  numbed  listlessness, 
ready  to  go  at  the  first  opportunity,  now  that  the  real  purpose 
of  the  interview  was  discharged.  But  suddenly  she  perceived  a 
new  pointedness  in  her  mother's  biting  summaries;  and  she 
turned,  with  a  slightly  startled  look  in  her  eyes. 

Her  mother  returned  the  gaze  with  savage  sarcasm. 

"Oh!  You  never  heard  of  the  Labor  Commissioner  and  his 
hired  character-assassin,  I  suppose!  Never — " 

"Yes,  but  I  did  n't  know  any  of  that  was  on  my  account." 

"No,  no,  indeed!  You  thought  it  was  just  a  little  whim  of 
your  father's  to  keep  his  factory  in  a  condition  that's  been  a 
scandal  in  the  community.  Fighting  off  legislation  —  bribing 
inspectors  —  just  his  little  bits  of  eccentric  self-indulgence.  You 
thought  that  ten  thousand  dollars  I  gave  to  the  Settlement  grew 
on  a  tree,  I  suppose.  You  — " 

"Mamma,"  said  Cally,  in  a  strained  voice,  "what  on  earth  are 
you  talking  about?  I  want  to  understand.  What  did  that  money 
you  gave  to  the  Settlement  have  to  do  — " 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


"Don't  you  know  he  needed  it  for  his  business?  "  cried  mamma, 
advancing  menacingly.  "I  tell  you  he'd  put  it  by  to  spend  it  on 
the  Works  this  fall,  and  stop  these  attacks  on  him.  And  why  did 
I  have  to  take  it  from  him,  but  on  your  account,  miss?  —  to  try 
to  clear  the  family  name  from  the  scandal  you  brought  upon  us — " 

"Wkatt" 

"A  scandal,"  continued  mamma,  in  a  crescendo  sweep,  "that 
all  but  undid  my  life  work  for  the  family's  position,  and  that  may 
yet  cost  your  father  his  presidency  at  the  bank." 

The  good  lady  easily  saw  that  she  had  struck  the  right  punitive 
note  at  last.  Indeed,  the  question  now,  Cally's  peculiarities  be 
ing  considered,  was  whether  she  had  not  struck  it  rather  too 
hard.  The  girl's  face  had  suddenly  become  the  color  of  paper. 
The  intense  concentration  of  her  gaze  was  painful  in  its  way, 
slightly  disconcerting  to  mamma. 

"Do  you  mean,"  said  Cally,  in  quite  a  shaky  voice  —  "do  you 
say  that  papa  —  meant  to  improve  the  Works  this  fall  —  and 
that  you  —  that  I— " 

"  I  mean  exactly  what  I  say,"  said  Mrs.  Heth,  resolutely.  "And 
I  say  it 's  high  time  you  were  beginning  to  understand  your  posi 
tion  in  this  family,  as  a  guide  to  your  strange  behavior.  Do 
you  suppose  your  father  enjoys  being  under  attack  all  the  time? 
Haven't  you  heard  him  say  a  hundred  times,  that  it  was  bad 
business  to  let  things  go  at  the  Works?  Where  were  you  six 
years  ago  when  he  said  we'd  have  to  economize  and  put  up  a 
new  building,  and  I  prevented  him  for  your  sake,  arguing  that 
you  were  just  coming  out  and  were  entitled  to  — " 

"Six  years!.  .  .  Why  .  .  .  why,  then  I'm  responsible  for  it 
all !  .  .  .  Why  —  I've  been  on  his  back  all  the  time  !" 

"  I 'm  glad  you  realize  it  at  last.  .  .  .  Oh,  well !"  said  her  mother, 
throwing  out  both  hands  and  speaking  with  a  kind  of  gruff  toler 
ance,  —  "there's  no  use  to  cry  about  it." 

"I'm  not  crying,"  said  Cally. 

She  was,  indeed,  not  crying  as  her  mother  had  usually  seen  het 
cry;  not  with  storm  and  racking.  Nevertheless,  two  indubitable 
drops  suddenly  glittered  upon  the  gay  lashes,  and  now  fell  silently 
as  Cally  spoke. 

452 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"But  I  could  cry,"  said  she,  "I'm  so  happy  ...  I'm  so  glad, 
to  know  it 's  all  been  my  fault  .  .  .You  don't  know  ...  I  went 
to  the  Works  the  other  day  - 

"Oh,  you  did!"  said  her  mother,  bitterly,  but  enlightened  a 
little.  "And  have  been  criticizing  your  father,  I  suppose,  the 
father  who  has  sacrificed  —  " 

"He'll  forgive  me  ...  He  must.  I'll  find  a  way." 

Mrs.  Heth,  flinging  herself  down  in  her  chair  again,  said  in  a 
voice  full  of  sudden  depression:  "I  should  say  you  owed  him 
apologies,  for  that  among  other  things.  .  .  .  Well,  I  give  you 
up." 

Cally  stood  unmoving,  slim  hands  locked  behind  her  head, 
staring  toward  the  window.  Gone  was  the  albatross  from  her 
young  neck,  melted  the  cloud  from  the  azure  round.  Wisdom  had 
come  with  such  startling  unexpectedness  that  she  could  not  take 
in  all  that  had  happened  to  her  just  now.  But  all  that  mattered 
was  as  plain  and  bright  as  the  sunshine  waiting  for  her  out  there. 
She,  and  not  papa  whom  she  had  so  wronged  in  her  thoughts,  had 
made  the  bunching-room  what  it  was;  she,  and  nobody  else, 
should  make  it  better  after  this.  And  through  the  splendid  con 
fusion  of  sensations  that,  mounting  within,  seemed  to  float  her 
away  from  this  solid  floor,  she  heard  one  clear  voice  sounding 
ever  louder  and  louder.  It  was  the  voice  of  the  prodigal,  chas 
tened  and  penitent:  "7  will  arise  and  go  to  my  father." 

Cally  turned  toward  the  door. 

Her  mother,  stirring  from  her  heavy  rebuking  apathy,  said: 
"Oh,  there's  no  use  bothering  him  now  to  say  you're  sorry. 
You've  not  thought  of  him  all  these  years  ..." 

"That's  why  I  can't  wait  —  now,"  said  Cally.  "And  besides, 
there 's  something  else  I  want  to  speak  to  him  about ...  A — a 
business  matter." 

Mamma  demanded  an  explanation.  And  Cally,  pausing  briefly 
at  the  door,  turned  upon  that  censorious  gaze  a  face  radiant  as 
the  morning. 

"I'm  going  to  give  him  my  fifty  thousand  dollars  to  build  a 
new  Works  with.  .  .  .  Won't  you  please  help  me  make  him  take 
it?" 

453 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

But  what  her  mother  may  have  replied  to  this  request  failed  to 
overtake  Cally,  flying  down  the  hall  to  the  telephone.  .  .  . 

The  bedroom  conference,  it  was  seen,  had  not  been  wholly  fruit 
less,  after  all.  Mrs.  Heth's  last  stand  for  Hugo  —  like  Hugo's 
last  afternoon  —  had  taken  a  slant  not  anticipated  by  her,  but 
at  least  wholesome  and  moral  in  its  effects.  Cally's  dreaded 
accusing  interview  in  the  study  gave  place,  beyond  all  imagin 
ing,  to  an  unpremeditated  outpouring  by  telephone,  in  which  her 
chief  fear  was  only  of  making  a  perfect  little  silly  of  herself.  And 
lastly,  Mr.  Heth,  called  summarily  from  a  directors'  meeting  at 
the  Fourth  National  Bank,  was  overflowed  with  such  a  wave 
of  feminine  incoherence  and  emotionalism  as  he  found  great 
difficulty  in  associating  with  his  usually  self-contained  little 
daughter.  .  .  . 

Papa  indeed,  knowing  nothing  of  any  conference  or  of  any  dark 
cloud  either,  was  treated  to  the  astonishment  of  his  life.  When 
he  finally  understood  that  the  house  was  not  in  flames,  or  his 
wife  stricken  with  a  deadly  malady,  when  he  began  to  get 
some  notion  of  what  all  the  strange  pother  was  about,  his 
replies,  for  the  most  part,  took  the  following  general  directions: 
(i)  that  little  Callipers  was  out  of  her  mind  with  her  sickness, 
did  n't  know  what  she  was  talking  about,  crazy,  and  the  greatest 
little  goose  that  ever  was;  (2)  that  she  had  no  business  ever  go 
ing  to  the  Works,  but  that  was  all  right  now,  and  he  did  n't 
want  to  hear  another  word  about  it;  (3)  that  he  could  n't  stop 
to  talk  such  foolishness  in  business  hours,  and  she'd  better  go 
and  lie  down  and  rest  and  get  her  senses  back;  (4)  that  he  gave 
her  that  money  for  herself,  and  when  he  got  dependent  on  his 
little  daughter,  he'd  let  her  know;  (5)  and  that  there,  there,  not 
to  bother  him  now,  we  'd  see,  after  lunch.  .  .  . 

Sufficiently  vague  replies  these;  yet  they  seemed  to  leave  the 
daughter  in  no  doubt  whatever  that  the  matter  which  had  all  in 
a  moment  become  dear  to  her  heart  was  as  good  as  settled.  For 
when  papa  terminated  the  conversation  by  smartly  ringing  off, 
she  immediately  called  another  number:  Jefferson  4127,  this  one 
was,  which,  as  the  book  shows  (only  she  did  not  look  at  the 

454 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


book)  is  the  number  assigned  to  Meeghan's  Grocery,  down  by 
the  old  Dabney  House.  .  .  . 

However  the  untutored  voice  at  Meeghan's  reported  that 
Doctor  was  out  on  his  rounds  and  not  to  be  reached  before  one 
o'clock.  So  Cally  had  to  defer  for  a  little  while  the  happiness 
she  would  have  in  telling  the  lame  wanderer  across  her  path 
that,  after  all,  his  eyes  had  not  put  their  trust  in  her  in  vain. 

Later  she  sat  again  on  a  revolving  seat  at  Gentlemen's  Furnish 
ings,  eagerly  purchasing  shirts,  cost  not  exceeding  one  dollar  each, 
for  James  Thompson,  aged  thirteen,  of  up-country.  It  happened 
to  be  her  work  to  do  in  the  world,  and  she*sra,s  doing  it. 

She  was  waited  upon  at  the  popular  counter  by  Miss  Whirtle 
herself,  whom  Cally  remembered  by  figure  if  not  by  name;  and 
she  was  so  extremely  agreeable  and  mollifying  in  her  manner  that 
the  Saleslady's  arrogance  thawed  away,  and  they  were  soon  dis 
cussing  questions  of  neck-sizes  and  sleeve-lengths  in  the  friendli 
est  intimacy.  There  were  collars  and  neckties  purchased,  too,  — 
these  items  Cally  added  on  her  own  account,  being  in  the  vein 
of  making  presents  to  people  to-day,  —  and  here  Miss  Whirtle's 
taste  was  invaluable  in  assisting  one  to  decide  which  were  the 
nobby  shapes  and  swell  patterns  and  which  the  contrary.  The 
robust  one  patted  her  transformation  many  times  at  Miss  Heth, 
invited  her  at  parting  to  call  again;  and  later  on  —  that  night,  it 
was  —  reported  the  whole  conversation  in  detail  in  the  Garland 
dining-room,  imparting,  we  need  not  doubt,  her  own  witty  flavor 
to  it  all. 

In  Baird  &  HimmePs  Cally  met  several  other  acquaintances, 
and  finally  Evey  McVey,  who  was  delighted  to  see  her  out 
again,  but  seemed  to  be  examining  her  rather  curiously,  doubt 
less  with  reference  to  Hugo  and  what  had  happened  in  that  quar 
ter.  Evey  herself  complained  of  being  tired;  so  Cally  drove  her 
second-best  friend  to  the  McVey  residence  in  the  car,  but  pleaded 
duties  at  home  against  getting  out  for  a  little  visit. 

And  then,  bowling  homeward  in  the  brisk  airs,  she  could  return 
to  her  own  thoughts  again,  which,  as  by  the  rubbing  of  an  Alad 
din's  lamp,  had  suddenly  become  so  happy  and  so  absorbing. 

455 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


Later,  she  must  think  about  mamma,  and  with  what  time  and 
solaces  she  could  close  that  breach.  But  in  these  hours  her 
thought  was  all  for  her  father,  whom  she  seemed  just  to  be  begin 
ning  to  understand  for  the  first  time  in  her  life.  .  .  . 

Now  all  the  imaginative  dreads  and  nightmare  terrors  were 
faded  away,  and  she  felt  beneath  her  feet  the  solid  sanity  of 
Hugo's  self.  She  had  seen  the  Works  on  an  exceptionally  bad 
day;  she  had  gone  there,  overdrawn  and  ignorant,  looking  for 
horrors;  what  she  had  actually  seen  and  felt  had  been  myste 
riously  intensified  a  hundredfold  by  her  violent  encounter  with 
Colonel  Dalhousie.  For  all  that  she  knew,  to  this  very  moment, 
the  Works  might  be,  indeed  (as  the  beautifully  tactful  girl 
Corinne  had  said),  the  best  place  to  work  in  town. 

But  what  Cally  was  thinking  now  was  that,  in  sitting  in  judg 
ment  on  her  father,  she  had  blindly  judged  him  as  if  he  were 
a  free  man  —  she,  of  all  people,  who  had  felt  so  poignantly  the 
imprisoning  powers  of  a  groove.  Now  it  appeared,  as  by  a  sud 
den  light  upon  him,  that  papa  had  always  been  clamped  fast  in  a 
groove  of  his  own,  exactly  as  she  had  been;  a  groove  fixed  for  him 
by  his  place  in  society,  by  the  way  other  men  ran  their  cheroot 
factories,  —  for,  of  course,  papa  must  do  as  his  competitors  did, 
or  be  crowded  out,  and  the  hardest-driving,  meanest  man  set  the 
pace  for  the  kind  ones,  like  papa,  —  and  last  and  chiefly  by  the 
extravagances  of  a  wife  and  daughter  who  always  cried  "give, 
give,"  and  did  n't  care  at  all  where  the  gifts  came  from.  How  could 
papa  possibly  be  free  with  two  costly  women  on  his  back  all  the 
time?  .  .  .  Strange  that  she  had  n't  grasped  all  this  clearly,  the 
minute  she  had  recognized  herself  as  a  horse-leech's  daughter.  .  . . 

Now  the  first  thing  to  do,  obviously,  was  to  get  off  papa's 
back  at  once.  Her  fifty  thousand  dollars  would  be  a  sound  starter 
there;  of  course  papa  would  take  it,  since  she  wanted  him  to  so 
much.  And  her  mind,  as  she  drove,  kept  recurring  to  this  sym 
bol,  kept  bringing  up  pictures  of  the  new  Works  that  would  be, 
built  perfect  with  her  money.  She  saw  it  considerably  like  the 
beautiful  marble  palace  of  her  childhood's  thought,  the  pride  of 
Canal  Street  without,  and  within  wonderfully  clean,  spacious 
and  airy,  and  most  marvellously  fragrant.  In  this  new  palace 

456 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


of  labor,  faints  and  swoons  were  things  undreamed  of.  Trim, 
smiling,  pretty  girls,  all  looking  rather  like  French  maids  in  a 
play,  happily  plied  their  light  agreeable  tasks;  and,  in  especial, 
the  cheeks  of  poor  Miller  (who  had  stoutened  gratifyingly)  were 
observed  to  blossom  like  the  rose. 

Yet  the  creator  of  all  these  wonders  was  well  aware  that  she 
was  not  giving  her  dowry  to  Miller,  exactly.  .  .  . 

Descending  from  the  car  at  her  own  door,  Cally  encountered 
Mr.  Pond,  of  the  Settlement.  The  dark-faced  Director  was  loaf 
ing,  oddly  enough,  on  Mrs.  Mason's  steps,  which  had  once  been 
Mr.  Beirne's,  four  doors  from  home.  He  raised  his  hat  about 
two  inches  at  the  sight  of  her,  returned  his  watch  and  some  type 
written  papers  to  his  pocket,  and  came  forward. 

"Don't  run,"  said  he,  unsmiling.  "I  want  to  know  plainly 
whether  or  not  you  are  coming  to  my  meeting  to-morrow.  Yes  or 
no." 

Cally  laughed  gaily.  There  was  a  radiance  within  her,  and 
she  liked  this  man  increasingly.  Several  times  they  had  met,  since 
their  antagonistic  talk  at  the  Settlement;  and  in  the  blunt 
Director's  manner  she  had  lately  observed  that  creeping  change 
which  she  had  witnessed  in  men  as  stalwart,  before  now.  .  .  . 

" Don't  look  so  fierce,"  said  she,  "for  I'll  not  be  bullied.  Or  at 
least  not  till  you  explain  why  you  're  hanging  around  in  front  of 
the  neighbors'  at  twelve  o'clock  in  the  morning  —  you  who  al 
ways  pretend  to  be  so  frightfully  busy." 

"Waiting  for  Vivian.  And  I  am  busy,  confound  him.  .  .  .  Not 
too  busy,  as  you  see,  to  take  a  kind  interest  in  your  welfare  —  " 

"Oh!  ...  Is  Dr.  Vivian  there  —  at  the  Masons'?  Why,  what 
are  you  waiting  for  him  for?" 

"Seems  to  me  you  ask  a  good  many  questions  for  an  idler." 

He  stood  on  the  sidewalk,  looking  up  at  her  with  his  hawk-eyes, 
a  man  yet  in  the  early  thirties,  but  of  obvious  power. 

"We're  going  to  buy  second-hand  benches,  if  you  must 
know,"  continued  he.  "He  says  he  can  show  me  where  to  get  'em 
cheap.  Anything  else? " 

"No-o  —  except .  .  .  How  much  will  the  benches  cost?  Per 
haps  I  —  might  be  able  to  contribute  something  — " 

457 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"I  don't  want  your  old  money,"  said  Pond.  "When  are  you 
going  to  be  serious  about  serious  things?" 

"I  think  now,"  said  Cally  .  .  .  "Only,  you  see,  I  don't  know 
anything  at  all." 

"I'll  teach  you,"  said  the  Director. 

Cally,  standing  on  the  broad  white  slab  before  her  own  door,  did 
not  answer.  Her  glance  had  turned  down  the  street:  and  at  this 
moment  there  emerged  from  the  Masons'  door  the  tall  figure  of 
V.  Vivian,  the  article-writer,  who  would  never  have  to  put  any 
thing  in  the  papers  about  papa  now.  He  saw  her  instantly,  and 
over  his  somehow  strange  and  old-fashioned  face  there  broke  a 
beautiful  smile.  He  lifted  his  hat  high,  and,  so  holding  it  at  height, 
posed  as  if  for  a  picture,  gave  it  something  like  a  wave,  as  in 
double  measure  of  greeting  and  good-will.  A  proper  salutation 
from  friend  to  friend;  and  the  sunlight  gleamed  on  his  crisp  fair 
hair.  .  .  . 

Cally's  return  greeting  was  somewhat  less  finished.  She  gave 
the  lame  doctor  one  look  of  brilliant  sweetness;  and  then  she  said 
to  him,  "Oh,  how  do  you  do?"  —  in  a  voice  that  he  could  not 
possibly  have  heard.  Next  she  said,  "Yes,  I'll  be  at  the  meeting 
to-morrow,"  with  her  back  turned  squarely  toward  Mr.  Pond. 
And  then  she  opened  her  door  and  went  in  quite  quickly,  leaving 
the  Director  staring  intently  at  a  crack  in  the  sidewalk.  .  .  . 

Within,  Cally  perceived  that  she  had  acted  rather  unreason 
ably,  missing  the  opportunity  to  tell  Mr.  V.  V.  that  she  desired  to 
speak  with  him:  but  that,  of  course,  was  only  because  she  had 
not  wanted  to  interrupt  and  detain  two  busy  men  at  their  labors. 
The  oversight,  besides,  was  easily  to  be  remedied;  though  she 
did  not  again  send  the  clear  call  for  Meeghan's.  She  decided  to 
write  a  brief  note  instead,  and  did,  asking  her  friend  if  he  could 
come  and  give  her  his  help  about  a  matter  —  say  at  four  o'clock 
that  afternoon.  The  note  was  dispatched,,  not  by  old  Moses  this 
time,  but  by  the  hand  of  an  urchin  in  a  blue  uniform,  who  was 
deep  in  "Lady  Helen,  the  Fair  Ghoul,"  as  he  bicycled,  but  ap 
parently  reached  his  destination  in  due  course. 

And  V.  Vivian,  once  again,  was  not  disobedient  to  the  heavenly 
summons. 


XXXII 

Time's  Jests,  and  now  the  Perfect  Apology,  to  stand  a  Lifetime  in 
Brick  and  Stone;  concluding  with  a  Little  Scene,  which  she 
will  remember  while  she  lives. 

SHE  had  called  him  untruthful  once  for  speaking  the  truth 
about  the  Works.  Now  she  would  make  her  apology  due, 
to  stand  a  lifetime  in  brick  and  stone.  This  Cally  did  for 
the  man  of  the  slums  to-day;  and  this  she  meant  him  to  under 
stand  without  much  speech,  since  speech,  in  the  circumstances, 
would  be  somewhat  difficult. 

But  then,  of  course,  she  could  know  nothing  of  those  colloquies 
Mr.  V.  V.  had  had  in  his  time  with  O'Neill,  the  hard-joking 
Commissioner,  of  inner  conflicts  he  had  had  of  late  all  by  himself. 
Nor  did  she  even  take  it  in  how  far  her  advancing  thought  of  him, 
and  of  all  this  subject,  had  outrun  anything  she  had  ever  put  into 
word  or  deed  before.  So  she  was  far  from  imagining  what  a 
miracle  she  made  for  him  this  afternoon,  like  a  midsummer  dream 
come  true;  far  from  guessing  how  he,  with  his  strange  uncon 
sciousnesses,  would  think  of  it  all  as  just  a  beautiful  but  detached 
happening,  a  glorious  coincidence.  .  .  . 

He  wore  for  this  meeting,  not  his  holiday  raiment  of  blue,  with 
the  sprigged  waistcoat  that  his  Uncle  Armistead  might  have  left 
him,  but  that  selfsame  suit  she  had  seen  upon  him  all  last  year; 
including  that  other  memorable  day  in  her  life  when  she  had 
come  clicking  down  the  stairs  to  find  the  tall  outlander  standing 
here  in  her  familiar  background.  Only  there  was  no  feeling  in 
her  now  that  he  was  an  alien  in  the  Heth  drawing-room.  No, 
here  V.  Vivian  seemed  to  belong  to-day,  the  best  and  worthiest 
thing  in  the  room. 

To  her,  that  was;  but  it  was  not  so  with  others.  The  one  speck 
in  the  perfect  balm  was  that,  to  have  this  man  here  at  all,  she  had 

had  to  manage  it  secretly,  as  if  it  were  something  discreditable 

459 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

The  greetings  were  over;  they  were  seated;  he  was  advised 
that  it  was  about  a  building  matter  that  she  desired  his  help;  and 
even  when,  as  talk  progressed,  she  placed  her  building  lot  for 
him  at  Seventeenth  and  Canal  Streets,  the  doctor's  manner, 
which  was  quite  eager  and  interested  and  pleased  at  being  sum 
moned  for  help,  showed  no  signs  of  understanding. 

"  Seventeenth  and  Canal  Streets,"  he  repeated,  alert  and 
businesslike.  "  Yes?  It's  to  be  a  business  building,  then?" 

"There's  a  building  there  now,  but  I'm  going  to  pull  that  one 
down,"  said  Cally.  "I  don't  like  it." 

And  at  this  moment  it  was  that  she  saw  consciousness  burst  into 

the  unconscious ;  burst  with  the  strong  suddenness  of  an  explosion. 

"Seventeenth  and  Canal  Streets  1 .  .  .  That's  the  Heth  Works 

corner!" 

"  That 's  the  building  I  'm  going  to  pull  down.  I  —  I  Ve  taken 
a  dislike  to  it." 

The  tall  young  man  came  to  his  feet,  slowly,  as  if  hoisted  from 
above  by  an  invisible  block  and  tackle.  All  in  a  moment,  his  face 
had  become  quite  pale. 

"  What  do  yo.u  mean?"  he  asked,  in  a  queer  clipped  voice. 

"  I  mean  ...  I  don't  think  you  will  have  to  say  anything  about 

my  father  in  your  articles.  .  .  .  We  're  going  to  build  a  new  Works 

—  now!" 

He  stood  staring  a  second  like  a  man  of  stone;  and  then  turned 
abruptly  from  her  and  walked  away.  But  in  that  second  she  saw 
that  his  petrifaction  was  already  scattering,  and  his  face  wore  the 
strangest  look,  like  a  kind  of  glory.  .  .  . 

So  Cally  thought  that  he  understood  now;  and  that  was  all  the 
reward  she  wanted.  Sitting  silent,  she  looked  after  his  retreating 
back.  She  perceived,  with  a  queer  little  twitching  in  her  heart, 
that  the  polished  spaces  upon  Mr.  V.  V.'s  right  elbow  had  thinned 
away  into  an  unmistakable  darning.  And  then  it  came  over  her 
quite  suddenly  that  the  reason  he  wore  this  suit  to-day  was 
probably  that  he  had  given  his  blue  suit  away,  to  one  of  his 
sick.  She  seemed  quite  sure  that  that  was  it.  And  oh,  how  like 
him,  and  like  nobody  else  in  the  world,  to  give  away  his  best  one, 
and  keep  the  patches  for  himself.  .  .  . 

460 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


And  the  first  thing  that  he  said,  returning  to  her  after  his 
thunderbolt  surprise,  seemed  also  beautifully  characteristic  of  his 
strange  faiths. 

"Well,  it's  wonderful,"  said  he,  in  quite  a  natural  voice.  "Of 
course,  the  greatest  thing  that  will  ever  happen  to  me.  .  .  .  And 
yet  —  it  may  seem  strange  to  you  —  but  I  Ve  felt  all  along  — 
I've  felt  —  that  something  like  this  might  probably  happen  any 
time." 

Moved  as  she  was,  Cally  could  have  smiled  at  that.  But 
when  she  saw  the  intense  honesty  of  his  face,  which  still  wore  that 
half-startled  yet  shining  look,  the  look  of  a  man  with  a  sudden 
secret  all  his  own,  she  did  not  smile,  and  her  own  thought  was 
given  quite  a  new  course. 

"Perhaps  you 're  a  nice  sort  of  mind-reader,"  said  she,  gently, 
"for  you  were  right  to  feel  that  way,  at  least  as  far  as  my  father 
is  concerned.  I  specially  wanted  you  to  know  about  that.  Papa 
has  been  planning  for  six  years  to  put  up  a  new  building  —  only 
last  month  he  had  arranged  to  spend  quite  a  lot  of  money  in 
repairs.  I  just  came  to  understand  all  this  to-day.  The  trouble 
has  been,"  said  Cally,  looking  up  at  the  old  family  enemy  with 
no  sense  of  hesitation  or  reluctance  —  "I've  always  been  too 
expensive,  you  see.  I  've  never  left  him  any  money  to  carry  out 
his  plans.  .  .  ." 

She  would  not  say  anything  about  horse-leech's  daughters, 
not,  of  all  things,  wanting  to  embarrass  him  to-day.  But  possibly 
his  mind  filled  in  a  hiatus  here,  and  there  was  no  mistaking  that 
what  she  said  about  her  father  impressed  him  profoundly. 

"I  ...  I  really  seem  to  have  known.  You  might  call  it  a  sort 
of  —  of  premonition  —  if  you  wanted  to  ...  Though  you  '11  natu 
rally  not  think  I've  acted  that  way." 

Mr.  V.  V.  stood  by  a  spindly  table,  carefully  examining  a 
small  but  costly  vase,  the  property  of  Mr.  Heth,  of  the  Cheroot 
Works;  and  now  he  went  on  with  a  kind  of  diffident  resolution, 
the  air  of  one  who  gives  a  confidence  with  difficulty,  but  must  do 
so  now,  for  his  honor. 

"  You  may  remember  my  telling  you  once  that  I  was  —  was 
sorry  to  write  the  factory  articles  you  just  mentioned.  The  truth 

461 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

is  I  've  hated  to  write  them  —  especially  as  to  —  as  to  the  Works. 
...  It's  just  the  sort  of  thing  I've  wanted  for  a  long  time  to 
write,  too.  I  had  the  argument  thought  out  down  to  the  bone. 
Oh,  they  're  good.  ...  I  —  I  was  going  to  send  the  first  lot  to  the 
*  Chronicle'  this  week.  ...  And  yet  —  well,  it's  been  pulling 
against  the  grain  somehow,  every  line  of  the  way.  It  seemed 
strange  .  .  .  And  now  I  see  that  I  must  have  felt  —  known  — 
all  along  .  .  .  But,"  said  the  strange  young  man,  setting  down 
the  vase  and  hurriedly  running  his  fingers  through  his  hair,  "I 
—  I  realize  that  this  must  sound  most  unconvincing  to  you. 
Probably  foolish.  No  matter.  ..." 

But  Cally  felt  by  now  that  she  understood  him  better  than 
he  understood  himself. 

"No,  I  think  I  understand,"  said  she.  "And  if  you  had  n't  felt 
that  way  —  don't  you  see?  —  it  never  would  have  happened." 

He  turned  on  her  another  strange  look,  at  once  intensely  in 
terested  and  intensely  bewildered.  But  she  glanced  away  from 
it  at  once,  and  would  give  him  no  chance  to  ask  her  what  that 
might  mean. 

"I've  got  so  much  I  want  to  tell  you,  so  much  I  want  to  ask 
your  advice  and  help  about,"  said  she,  rising,  with  a  change  to 
what  she  regarded  as  an  excellent  business  voice  and  manner. 
"Perhaps  we  ought  to  go  into  executive  session  at  once  —  and 
let 's  go  into  the  library,  too !  I  know  you  're  awfully  busy,  but  I 
do  hope  you've  come  prepared  to  make  a  good  long  visit." 

The  article-writer  neglected  to  reply  at  all,  moving  after  her 
with  his  queer,  startled  look.  .  .  . 

So  these  two  passed  from  the  Heth  drawing-room  to  the  Heth 
library,  to  talk  about  business:  the  new  Heth  Works,  in  fine. 
They  came  into  a  room  which  was  intimately  and  poignantly 
associated  with  Hugo  Canning.  Memories  of  the  departed 
greeted  Cally  upon  the  threshold,  and  thereafter;  only  they  were 
not  poignant  now.  Hugo's  face  kept  rising  mistily  beside  the 
so  different  visage  of  the  man  he  had  instinctively  disliked,  his 
ancient  hoodoo.  .  .  . 

This  was  to  be  a  meeting  like  none  other  Cally  had  ever  had 
with  the  stranger  in  her  house,  a  happy  meeting,  troubled  by  no 

462 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

shadow.  They  sat  down  across  the  great  table  from  each  other,  in 
good  business  style,  as  she  considered;  and  then  she  began  to  talk 
eagerly,  recounting  to  him  without  any  embarrassment,  though 
of  course  with  some  judicious  expurgation,  what  had  been  going 
on  in  her  mind,  and  out  of  it,  during  the  last  five  days;  begin 
ning  with  the  afternoon  she  had  seen  him  at  the  Cooneys',  and 
culminating  with  the  long  talk  she  had  had  with  her  father  at, 
and  after,  luncheon  to-day. 

And  he,  the  only  confidant  she  had  ever  had,  sitting  with  his 
patched  elbow  on  her  father's  table,  and  his  chin  in  his  cupped 
hand,  attended  every  word  with  his  singular  quality  of  interest. 
He  was  unique  among  all  the  people  she  had  known,  in  that 
the  things  he  seemed  to  care  most  about  were  never  things  for 
himself  at  all.  ... 

"So  that's  how  it  stands  now,"  said  Cally,  presently.  "My 
father  was  naturally  surprised  at  first,  as  I ' ve  never  shown  any 
interest  in  his  work  before,  and  of  course  he  said  he  would  n't  do 
it,  —  would  n't  take  my  money,  I  mean,  though  it's  really  his 
all  the  time.  But  at  last  I  did  get  him  to  talking  about  it  seriously, 
and  then  he  grew  more  and  more  interested.  .  .  .  Oh,  I  know  he's 
going  to  do  it!  I  know  it!  —  That's  all  settled!  And  I  do  think 
he  '11  let  me  have  a  hand  in  really  planning  it  —  that  is,  if  I  can 
show  him  that  I  —  I  know  anything  about  it.  ...  Well,  of  course 
I  don't,  you  see  —  nothing,  nothing !  —  and  that 's  where  my 
problem  begins.  I  've  got  to  learn  everything,  from  the  very  start, 
and  do  it  quickly.  ...  Do  you  think  I  possibly  can?  — ' 

"Books!"  he  cried,  throwing  out  both  hands.  "What 're  they 
for  but  to  teach  us  everything,  right  away  ?  .  .  ." 

In  fact,  her  problem  there  was  really  no  problem  at  all,  it 
seemed.  Pond  himself  had  at  hand  a  fine  little  general  library 
on  all  these  subjects;  there  was  the  State  Library;  there  were 
the  bookstores  of  the  world :  all  waiting  for  her,  all  packed  with 
meaty  information.  Perhaps,  just  as  a  starter,  she  would  let 
him  make  out  a  sort  of  preliminary  check-list  to-night,  out  of 
catalogues,  out  of  some  bully  advertisements  in  the  backs  of 
Pond's  books.  . . . 

"Oh,  you  are  nice!"  exclaimed  Cally.  "You  can't  guess  what 

463 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


it  means  to  be  encouraged!  ...  I  do  so  want  to  go  into  it  se 
riously." 

He  talked  further,  indicating  the  procedure:  first  her  own  idea 
of  what  she  wanted;  then  an  architect  to  sketch  some  plans; 
then  a  builder  to  figure  after  the  architect.  The  thing  began  to 
shape  up,  rapidly,  definitely.  She  found  him  an  inspiriting 
soul.  .  .  . 

"I  ought  to  say,"  she  explained,  quite  excited,  "  that  I  men 
tioned  fifty  thousand  dollars  only  because  that  was  the  sum  I 
happened  to  have,  in  a  lump.  But  we're  going  to  make  it 
good,  no  matter  what  it  costs.  I  have  a  little  more  money  of 
my  own,"  said  she,  "about  eight  thousand  dollars,  and  of 
course  I  '11  put  that  in,  too.  And  I  know  my  father  will  feel 
the  same  way." 

But  no,  V.  V.'s  belief  was  that  the  sum  she  mentioned  would 
be  far  more  than  necessary.  She  could  get  a  rough  sort  of  esti 
mate  at  once,  if  desired,  given  the  dimensions  of  the  lot  and  a 
general  idea  of  the  style  of  building  she  wanted.  His  friend, 
Jem  Noonan,  he  who  was  just  now  starting  out  as  a  contractor, 
would  be  only  too  delighted  to  do  some  figuring  on  it. 

"Of  course  the  best  way  of  all  to  gather  ideas  at  the  start," 
said  he,  staring  through  her,  "is  to  go  to  the  Works  —  go 
often.  .  .  .  There's  no  other  such  way  of  seeing  what  the  actual 
needs  are." 

"Yes  .  .  .  Yes,  of  course  that's  true,"  said  Cally. 

But  what  she  felt  like  saying  was  that  she  did  n't  want  to  go 
to  the  Works  at  all,  unless  he  could  go  with  her. 

"I  want  to  get  your  ideas  now,  please,"  she  added  —  "every 
thing  you  can  think  of.  You  can't  have  any  notion  how  ignorant 
I  am.  .  .  .  But  —  oh,  there's  one  thing  I  wanted  to  speak  to  you 
about  first.  I  suppose  —  even  at  the  best  —  it  would  be  some  time 
before  the  new  building  could  begin?" 

Oh,  a  few  months,  no  doubt,  before  all  plans  would  be  ready, 
and  her  father's  arrangements  made  to  move. 

"Do  you  think  the  floors  in  this  old  building  are  very  strong  ? 
The  man  who  was  with  me  the  day  I  went  there  did  n't  seem  to 
think  so  —  and  I  did  n't  either!  And  some  very  heavy-looking 

464 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

new  machines  were  being  put  in  the  bunching-room,  and  I  believe 
some  more  are  going  to  be  put  in  to-morrow." 

"Oh!  .  .  .  You  mean  you  think  they  might  overload  the 
floor?" 

"Don't  you?" 

"Well  — it's  possible,"  admitted  Mr.  V.  V.,  slowly,  and  one 
could  see  that  he  did  n't  altogether  like  the  idea  of  anybody's 
criticizing  Mr.  Heth's  conduct  of  his  business.  "But  —  ah  — 
really  I  don't  —  " 

"  Could  n't  we  fix  it,  in  some  simple  way  —  brace  up  the 
floor  somehow?" 

"Oh,  yes.  You'd  have  no  trouble  in  fixing  it ...  Far  as  that 
goes." 

"Don't  you  think  you  could  manage  to  say  we  once?" 

"Oh!"  said  Mr.  V.  V.,  pleased.  "I  could  that! ...  I  did  n't 
know,  you  see,  how  far  you  cared  to  let  me  in." 

Cally  smiled  at  him  over  the  library  table. 

"Has  n't  it  occurred  to  you  that  you  are  in  it,  that  you've 
been  right  in  the  middle  of  it  all  along?" 

He  gave  her  one  of  his  original  looks,  and  said:  "Well,  I  can't 
say  it  had.  .  .  .  But  it's  where  I'd  rather  be  than  anywhere  else 
in  the  world." 

"You  can  make  nice  speeches,  at  any  rate.  .  .  .  Do  you  know 
you're  the  strangest  man,  I  believe,  that  ever  lived?" 

"No,  that's  news.  Am  I?  ...  Well,  in  what  way  am  I  so 
strange?" 

"Oh,  it's  a  long,  long  story.  But  I'm  going  to  tell  it  all  to  you 
some  day.  ...  Do  go  on  and  help  me  about  the  floors.  Papa 
won't.  He  did  n't  seem  to  like  my  speaking  about  them  at  all. 
He  says  they  'd  hold  hundreds  more  machines  if  he  only  had  the 
room  —  " 

"Well,  he  knows.  ...  He's  —  he's  had  the  strain  figured  out. 
Of  course." 

So  had  Time,  the  master-humorist,  reversed  positions  between 
Heths  and  Vivians.  The  old  Arraigner,  for  his  part,  seemed  to 
feel  now  that,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  papa  had  put  up  the 
building  six  years  ago.  .  .  . 

465 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


But  Cally  explained  how  floors  and  machines  had  got  upon  her 
nerves.  This  was,  she  said,  our  first  point  to  settle.  And  there 
upon  the  young  man  at  once  addressed  himself  to  the  question  of 
remedies;  sketching  with  his  finger  on  the  table- top,  till  she  got 
note-paper  and  pencils  from  mamma's  desk  in  the  corner,  switched 
light  into  a  reading-lamp,  and  came  and  sat  down  beside  him.  On 
the  paper  V.  V.  obligingly  produced  an  outline  of  the  three  floors 
of  the  present  factory,  accurately  locating  stairway  and  elevator 
shaft;  even  the  point  where  the  cloakroom  was  to  be  knocked  out 
to  give  the  space  needed  for  the  new  machines.  .  .  . 

"How  in  the  world  do  you  know  so  much  about  the  Works?" 

"Oh  —  well,  you  see,  the  shipping  clerk  there  is  quite  a  friend 
of  mine,"  said  V.  V.  "A  very  nice  fellow,  sort  of  a  Lithuanian, 
named  Dolak.  Don't  be  offended,  but  I  —  I  've  been  down  there 
once  or  twice  at  night." 

However,  he  seemed  stumped  as  to  the  best  method  of  support, 
admitting  that  it  was  not  so  simple  as  it  seemed.  And  presently, 
when  he  had  tried  and  condemned  columns  from  floor  to  floor, 
the  girl  said,  hesitatingly: 

"Dr.  Vivian,  do  you  think  props  —  outside  —  would  do  any 
good?" 

He  turned  his  intent  gaze  upon  her;  he  was  frowning  absorb- 
edly  and  looking  rather  doubtful  about  it  all. 

"I  mean  iron  braces  running  from  the  ground  on  each  side  of 
the  building,"  said  Cally  —  "and  holding  up  girders,  or  what 
ever  you  call  them,  under  the  bunching-room  floor?" 

He  gazed  a  moment,  and  then  exclaimed: 

"Oh  —  good!  Oh,  that  's  good!  .  .  .  That  would  do  it  —  do  it 
perfectly!  .  .  . 

He  proceeded  with  eagerness  to  sketch  in  her  square-arch 
braces  under  his  bunching-room  floor,  and  he  said  again:  "Per 
fect  solution!  .  .  .  Why,  you  ought  to  have  been  a  builder!" 

"Oh,  I — just  happened  to  see  a  picture  of  something  like  that 
in  the  encyclopaedia  this  afternoon." 

Her  tone  was  depreciatory,  not  suggesting  that  she  had  looked 
some  time  before  she  happened  to  see  that  picture.  But  within 
she  was  feeling  the  strangest,  the  most  exhilarating  thrills  .  . 

466 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


Oh,  the  clearness  of  being  a.  fellow-worker;  of  praise  that  had 
nothing  to  do  with  a  candidacy  for  matrimony!  .  .  . 

"But  the  difficulty,"  she  said,  "is  to  persuade  papa  to  let  me 
do  it.  Of  course,  I've  no  right  to  expect  him  to  take  me  seri 
ously.  ...  I  know  you  could  persuade  him. " 

That,  spoken  impulsively,  she  hurriedly  covered  up  in  conver 
sation;  begging  him  to  go  on  at  once  and  give  her  his  ideas  of 
what  the  new  building  should  be  like.  She  had  gathered  by 
now,  that,  whatever  he  considered  wonderful  in  all  this,  it  was 
not  the  fact  that  he,  she,  and  her  father  should  be,  so  to  say, 
planning  it  shoulder  to  shoulder.  But  this  fine  unconsciousness 
of  his  she  herself  could  not  match;  not  at  least  till  she  had  had 
more  time  to  smooth  things  over  with  her  father.  .  .  . 

However,  talk  of  mere  temporary  repairs  in  condemned  old 
buildings  was  quickly  swallowed  in  plannings  for  the  splendid 
new.  Here  the  man  from  the  outskirts  indubitably  shone;  he 
bristled  with  illuminating  ideas.  He,  it  seemed,  was  for  a  four- 
story  building,  brick,  with  concrete  floors.  Much  he  had  to  say 
on  the  subject  of  fire-escapes  and  patent-doors,  lunch-rooms 
and  rest-rooms  with  lockers,  enclosed  stairways  and  elevator 
shafts;  shower-baths,  too,  if  one  simply  must  have  the  best 
and  never  mind  the  expense.  And  then  his  pencil  began  uncon 
sciously  to  work  as  he  went  along;  and  presently  there  emerged 
upon  a  fresh  sheet  of  mamma's  best  note-paper  the  first  visible 
presentment  of  the  Works  that  would  be.  There  it  actually  was, 
for  you  to  gaze  at,  dream  over;  the  perfect  apology:  the  front 
and  side  elevation  of  a  fine,  dignified,  business-like  building, 
plain  yet  undeniably  handsome,  very  substantial  and  roomy, 
very  full  of  airy  windows.  Not  like  a  marble  palace,  after  all; 
but  a  child  could  see  that  nobody  was  ever  crowded  in  there, 
nobody  ever  the  least  faint.  Nothing  homicidal  here,  Mr.  V.  V., 
look  where  you  will.  .  .  . 

"You  can  draw,  too!" 

"Straight  lines,"  said  V.  V.,  modestly.  But  he  regarded  his 
handiwork  with  passionate  approbation,  and  finished  it  off 
gallantly  with  a  flag  flying  from  the  roof  and  two  stately  motor 
trucks  (so  he  said)  wheeling  by  the  door. 

467 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"Oh,  how  beautiful!"  cried  Cally  Heth. 

And  it  was  all  so  curiously  exciting  to  her,  so  intensely  inter 
esting.  No  prospect  in  her  life,  it  seemed,  had  ever  stirred  her 
like  this  strange  one;  a  new  cigar-factory,  born  of  her  purse  and 
heart.  .  .  . 

Once,  about  at  this  point,  the  young  man  threw  out  with  mys 
terious  delight: 

"I'll  like  to  see  old  Sam  O'Neill's  face,  when  he  hears  about 
this." 

In  the  midst  of  the  animated  talk  came  Annie,  the  parlormaid 
—  and  Cally  started  at  the  sound  of  the  approaching  feet,  and 
hated  herself  for  it  —  to  say  that  Dr.  Vivian  was  wanted  at 
the  telephone.  The  doctor  seemed  annoyed  by  the  summons, 
though  not  surprised;  he  had  had  to  take  the  liberty,  he  ex 
plained  as  he  rose,  of  leaving  word  at  his  office  where  he  could 
be  found,  in  case  of  necessity  —  words  of  this  sort  being  left, 
as  we  know,  with  his  paid  assistant,  Mrs.  Garland,  the  world's 
biggest  office-boy. 

So  V.  Vivian  was  led  away  by  Annie  to  the  downstairs  tele 
phone  in  the  butler's  pantry;  whence  he  was  back  in  a  moment, 
looking  relieved,  and  assuring  Miss  Heth  that  it  was  nothing 
in  the  least  urgent  or  important.  There  was  no  hurry  at  all, 
it  seemed.  But  Cally  felt  that  the  business  talk  was  drawing  to 
a  close,  with  a  good  deal  still  left  unsaid.  .  .  . 

Returning  with  eager  interest  to  his  drawing,  Mr.  V.  V.  fell 
to  planting  shade-trees  of  the  best  quality  all  down  the  Seven 
teenth  Street  side  of  the  new  building.  So  engaged,  he  ob 
served  suddenly: 

"Don't  worry  any  more  about  those  floors,  please  —  will 
you?  That 's  all  going  to  work  out  very  nicely.  ...  I  '11  get  a 
figure  from  Jem  Noonan  right  away  on  that  plan  of  yours.  And 
I'll  see  that  it's  a  low  figure,  too,  —  it's  got  to  be  low!  .  .  . 
Good  heavens! "  said  V.  V.,  eyeing  his  drawing  with  a  queer  little 
introspective  smile.  "We  can't  be  expected  to  spend  anything 
much  on  a  building  that's  going  to  come  down  in  a  couple  of 
months,  you  know." 

She  looked,  smiling  a  little,  too,  at  his  unconscious  face,  fine 

468 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


to  thinness,  which  had  once  made  Mr.  Pond  think  of  a  bishop 
who  never  grew  up.  And  her  look  became  suddenly  full  of  ten 
derness.  .  .  . 

"I  don't  worry,"  said  Cally,  "now  that  I've  got  you  to  help 
me." 

The  man  from  the  Dabney  House  spoke  again: 

"I  was  just  thinking,  out  there  at  the  telephone,  that  if  there's 
no  further  business  before  the  house,  you  might  feel  like  begin 
ning  that  long  story  you  —  you  spoke  of  just  now." 

That  took  her  by  surprise.  She  seemed  to  be  less  and  less  at 
her  ease.  But  now  surely  had  come  her  moment  to  take  her 
courage  in  her  hands,  and  render  him  his  due. 

"I  believe  I  ought  to,"  said  she,  lightly  —  "a  chapter  or  two, 
at  least.  For  I  don't  think  you  '11  ever  work  it  out  for  your 
self  .  .  .  And  I'm  glad  you're  that  way." 

He  made  no  reply,  going  on  carefully  with  his  arbor-day  practice. 

"When  you  said  just  now  that  this  was  wonderful,"  said 
Cally,  beginning  to  lose  the  light  touch  already —  "you  meant 
that  it  was  a  wonderful  happening,  did  n't  you?  Your  idea 
seems  to  be  that  all  this  just  happened." 

But  no,  Mr.  V.  V.  denied  that  vigorously,  and  stated  his  logical 
theory:  that  her  father  had  chanced  to  postpone  his  intentions, 
merely  through  the  well-known  fact  that  men  get  accustomed 
to  conditions  that  they  constantly  see;  but  that  she,  going  there 
with  fresh  eyes  .  .  . 

"I  might  have  gone  there  a  hundred  times,  but  I'd  never 
have  thought  of  it  as  having  anything  to  do  with  me  —  don't 
you  know  it?  —  if  it  had  n't  been  for  you." 

He  looked  at  her  briefly;  and  she  saw  that  his  look  was  as  be 
wildered  as  a  battle-ground. 

"Oh!  .  .  .  Do  you  mean  that  you  are  doing  it  because  of  — 
to  —  to  avoid  the  —  that  is,  on  account  of  the  articles? " 

"Oh,  not  the  articles!  —  no!  That's  just  what  I  don't  mean. 
I've  never  thought  of  the  articles!  I  don't  think  of  you  that 
way  at  all  ..."  ; 

She  stopped  precipitately,  somehow  divining  that  she  was 
mysteriously  wounding  him.  And  then  suddenly  she  understood 

469 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


that  that  was  the  way  he  thought  of  himself,  exactly;  that  he, 
who  unconsciously  moved  mountains  by  his  gentleness,  some 
how  saw  himself  only  in  the  light  of  his  "terrible"  (but  still 
unpublished)  articles.  It  was  as  if  he  reckoned  himself  as  either 
an  article-writer,  or  nothing.  .  .  . 

" Though  it's  true,"  said  Cally,  gently,  with  hardly  any  pause 
at  all,  "that  through  most  of  the  time  I've  known  you  I've 
thought  of  you  ...  as  a  hard  man  .  .  .  terribly  uncompromising." 

His,  it  was  clear,  was  not  a  tongue  that  spoke  easily  about 
himself.  He  finished  putting  a  flower-box  into  a  window  of  the 
new  Works,  before  he  said: 

"I  hope  we  need  n't  trouble  now  about  anything  at  all  that 's 
past." 

"That's  what  I  hope,  too  .  .  .  more  than  you  could.  And 
besides  —  I've  always  liked  you  best  when  you  were  gentle. 
And  ...  it 's  because  of  what  you  've  taught  me  —  at  those 
times  —  that  I'm  doing  this  to-day." 

Again  he  turned  his  singularly  lucid  gaze  full  upon  her;  and 
now  his  look  was  absolutely  startled.  Color  was  coming  into  his 
face.  His  short,  crisp  hair,  which  had  been  parted  so  neatly  an 
hour  ago,  stood  rumpled  all  over  his  head,  not  mitigating  the 
general  queerness  of  his  appearance.  And  yet  his  mouth  wore  a 
smile,  humorous  and  disparaging. 

"May  I  ask  what  you  consider  that  I've  taught  you?" 

"Everything  I  know,"  said  Cally,  lacing  a  pencil  between  her 
fingers. 

"Why!  .  .  .  When  we've  never  even  had  a  real  talk  about  it 
before!  ...  I  told  you  once  that  you  were  more  generous 
than- 

"No,  I'm  never  generous  enough.  That's  my  trouble,  among 
others.  .  .  .  But  if  you  think  that  it 's  a  nice  and  happy  thing  for 
us  to  be  putting  up  this  building,  I  want  you  please  always  to 
remember  .  .  .  that  you've  done  it  all  yourself." 

There  was  a  tense  silence,  out  of  which  his  voice  spoke,  no 
longer  with  any  trace  of  humor. 

"Don't  be  polite.  ...  I  could  n't  quite  stand  it.  Do  you 
mean  that?" 

470 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

"It's  all  a  failure  if  you  won't  believe  that  I  do." 

"Then  I  do  believe  it." 

This  time  the  silence  ran  somewhat  longer,  and  again  it  was 
V.  V.'s  voice,  greatly  stirred,  that  broke  it. 

"I  don't  understand,  but  I  do  believe  it.  ...  And  it  makes 
me  pretty  proud.  By  George,  pretty  proud!  .  .  .  Why  —  I've 
talked  a  lot  —  but  it's  the  first  thing  I've  ever  accomplished! 
The  first  thing " 

His  voice  showed  that  his  mind  had  swept  away  from  her, 
over  spaces;  and  Cally  raised  her  eyes  and  looked  at  him.  He 
sat  gazing  wide-eyed  into  the  dull-green  glow  of  her  lamp,  on 
his  face  a  curious  and  moving  look;  a  look  humbled  yet  exalted, 
gloriously  wondering,  and  to  her  the  wistfullest  thing  she  had 
ever  seen  in  her  life.  He,  who  had  given  away  his  patrimony, 
who  was  giving  away  his  life  every  day  with  a  will,  thought  that 
this  was  the  first  thing  .  .  . 

All  that  was  sweetest  in  the  girl,  all  that  was  maternal  and 
understanding,  rose  fiercely  within  her,  stormed  her  with  a 
desire  to  mother  this  man,  to  protect  him  from  his  own  royal 
yet  somehow  infinitely  sad  self-denials.  For  this  moment  she 
felt  far  stronger  than  he.  His  hand,  with  the  pencil  in  it,  lay 
on  the  table  close  by  her,  and  Cally  closed  her  slim  fingers  over 
it  with  a  firm  clasp. 

"Ah,  don't  say  that,  Mr.  V.  V.  —  don't  look  that  way.  It 
hurts  me,  in  my  heart.  .  .  .  Can't  I  make  you  believe  that 
you've  accomplished  more  than  anybody  else  in  the  world?  ..." 

He  did  not  move  at  the  shock  of  her  touch,  at  the  sound  of 
his  little  name  upon  these  unaccustomed  lips.  She  was  aware 
only  of  a  subtle  contraction,  a  sort  of  tightening  going  on  some 
where  within  him.  So  Cally  finished  her  small  speech  with  her 
hand  over  his.  But  at  just  that  point,  a  stir  seemed  to  shake 
through  the  man;  he  was  seen  to  be  turning  his  head;  and  in  the 
same  breath,  her  moment  of  high  strength  broke  abruptly.  The 
veins  fluttered  queerly  in  the  forward  hand;  she  felt  a  quick 
flush  rising  somewhere  within,  spreading  and  tingling  upward 
into  her  face.  So  Cally  rose  hurriedly,  her  hand  withdrawn,  and 
moved  away.  But  she  did  her  best,  for  her  pride's  sake,  to 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

envelop  her  movement  with  a  matter-of-fact  air;  and  when  she 
had  got  about  four  steps  away  from  him,  she  remarked,  quite 
distinctly: 

"Don't  get  up.  ...   I  ...  want  to  get  something." 

And  she  did,  in  fact,  go  on  to  mamma's  desk  and  attentively 
select  three  more  sheets  of  note-paper,  which  would  no  doubt 
come  in  handy  for  something  or  other  some  day. 

And  out  of  the  stillness  behind  her  came  Mr.  V.  V.'s  voice, 
just  a  little  husky  now: 

"No  one  ever  did  anything  so  sweet  to  me  before." 

But  that  only  made  things  worse,  turning  a  white  light,  as  it 
were,  on  thoughts  she  had  had  before  now  of  the  loneliness  of 
his  life.  So  she,  finding  herself  not  strong  enough  to  be  a  com 
forter  after  all,  said  in  a  resolute  kind  of  way: 

"I  never  like  to  hear  my  friends  depreciated.  So  please  don't 
do  it  any  more.  .  .  .  What  was  the  name  of  that  book  about 
factories  —  the  one  you  said  that  Mr.  Pond  had?" 

Silence  behind  her,  and  then:  "'The  New  Factory  Idea,'  by 
T.  B.  Halton." 

She  noted  this  information  carefully  on  one  of  her  sheets  of 
paper,  thus  proving  that  she  was  right  to  go  and  get  them,  all 
the  time. 

"I  thought,"  said  she,  "I  might  see  if  Saltman  had  it.  Then 
I  could  begin  to  cram  to-night." 

But  no,  he  said  that  Saltman  had  n't  it,  but  would  order  it,  of 
course.  And  then  the  scraping  of  a  chair-leg  advised  all  listeners 
that  Mr.  V.  V.  was  violating  that  injunction  laid  upon  him  as 
to  not  getting  up.  ... 

He  advanced  round  the  table-end,  his  hand  raised  in  his  nerv 
ous  and  characteristic  gesture.  So  anyone  who  wished  could  see 
that  deficiency  at  his  elbow,  about  which  he  himself  seemed 
so  splendidly  indifferent.  He  was  as  tall  as  Hugo;  but  Hugo, 
with  his  lordly  good  looks  and  beautiful  clothes,  was  certainly  a 
much  more  eye-catching  figure.  And  yet,  as  she  straightened 
now  and  looked,  the  knowledge  shot  suddenly  through  Cally 
that  this  doctor  in  his  patches  somehow  looked,  that  he  had 
always  looked,  rather  the  finer  gentleman  of  the  two.  .  .  . 

472 


V.    V.  's     Eyes       . 

"Johnson's  the  publisher,"  said  V.  V.,  coming  to  a  halt  in 
front  of  her.  And  then,  taking  the  sheets  of  note-paper  un 
consciously  from  her  unresisting  hands,  he  added,  looking 
down: 

"But  —  how'd  you  mean  just  now  .  .  .  that  I  —  I've  accom 
plished  so  —  so  much?" 

By  now  Cally  could  smile,  in  quite  a  natural-seeming  way;  and 
this  she  did,  full  under  the  prophetic  gaze,  revealing  shining  white 
teeth  and  glimpses  of  a  rose-lined  mouth.  And  if  she  was  a 
Hun,  she  had  always  been  the  loveliest  of  them,  God  wot.  .  .  . 

"I'm  beginning  to  believe,"  said  she,  "that  you're  not  such 
a  very  strange  man,  after  ..." 

So  she  ended;  her  gaze  shifting,  the  smile  dying  on  her  lip. 
For  the  door  of  the  library  had  opened  authoritatively,  and  that 
difficulty  which  had  embarrassed  her  all  through  the  afternoon 
suddenly  confronted  her  upon  the  threshold. 

Mr.  Heth,  of  the  Works,  en  route  to  his  study,  was  briefly  sur 
prised  by  the  little  tableau  he  had  stumbled  upon.  But  seeing 
young  men  about  the  house  at  all  hours  was  no  nine  days'  won 
der  for  him;  and  he  came  on  in  with  quite  his  usual  air. 

"Ah,  Cally!  Did  n't  know  anybody  was  in  here,"  said  papa; 
and  he  glanced  from  her,  with  amiable  expectancy,  toward  the 
stranger.  "What's  this  confabulation  about?" 

Cally  felt  herself  turning  white.  She  steadied  herself  with  one 
hand  on  the  writing-leaf  of  the  desk. 

"We  were  talking  about  the  new  Works,"  said  she.  .  .  . 
"Papa  —  I  want  to  introduce  a  good  friend  of  mine  —  Dr. 
Vivian." 

"Oh,  Mr.  Heth!  ...  I'm  so  glad  to  know  you,  sir." 

Thus  the  fearless  young  voice  at  her  side.  But  Cally  was  gaz 
ing,  transfixed,  at  her  father,  on  whose  face  the  friendly  greeting 
air  was  giving  place  to  astonished  displeasure,  not  untouched 
with  indignation.  He  had  stopped  short  in  the  middle  of  the 
floor,  and  the  hand  he  had  been  automatically  putting  out  fell 
dead  at  his  side. 

"Oh!  —  Ah!  —  Dr.  Vivian!"  said  Mr.  Heth,  with  the  stiffest 
inclination.  And  then,  his  look  going  from  one  to  the  other 

473 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

of  the  two  young  people,  he  added,  as  if  involuntarily:  "Viv 
ian?  ...  Ah!  I'd  —  have  expected  a  different-looking  man! 

The  pause  then,  the  suspense  of  all  action  from  the  world,  was 
infinitesimal.  But  it  seemed  long  to  Cally.  And  she  thought  she 
could  never  forgive  her  father  if  he  -turned  away,  leaving  this 
slight  upon  her  friend. 

"Papa,"  she  began,  unsteadily,  "I  don't  think  .  .  ." 

But  once  again  her  sentence  hung  unended.  V.  V.,  advanc 
ing,  came  then  into  her  line  of  vision;  and  Cally  saw  that  he  had 
no  thought  for  the  cover  of  her  skirt.  Her  father's  forbidding 
deportment  had  not  escaped  the  young  man;  there  were  both 
a  diffidence  and  a  dignity  in  his  bearing.  And  yet  she  saw  that 
his  face  wore  like  a  flower  that  guileless  and  confiding  look  he 
had,  the  look  of  a  man  who  cannot  doubt  that,  in  their  hearts,  all 
mean  as  kindly  as  he  himself.  He  moved  upon  her  silent  father  as 
if  .singing  aloud  an  immortal  faith  in  the  goodness  of  his  fellows : 
Though  he  slay  me,  yet  will  I  trust  him.  .  .  . 

But  what  his  audible  voice  was  saying  was  very  simple,  and  a 
little  embarrassed: 

"I've  felt  that  I've  just  come  to  know  you  to-day,  Mr.  Heth 
...  to  understand  things  better.  I  suppose  it 's  too  much  to  hope 
that  you  can  forget  what's  past,  all  at  once.  But  I'd  be  mor 
tified  to  feel  .  .  .  Ah,  sir!  —  I've  felt  honored  by  your  House 
to-day.  .  .  ." 

That  was  all;  the  mists  lifted.  He  saw  no  difficulties,  and  so 
there  were  none.  Papa's  face  was  thawing  back,  through  several 
surprised  looks,  to  its  natural  kindliness;  he  had  taken  the 
offered  hand,  in  the  middle  of  the  little  speech;  and  then,  within 
a  minute,  he  was  saying,  quite  amiably,  that  well,  well,  we'd  say 
no  more  about  it ...  s'posed  the  thing  to  do  was  to  let  bygones 
be  bygones.  .  .  . 

And  papa's  daughter,  Cally,  turned  away  quickly  from  that 
spectacle,  winking  furiously,  and  wondering  when  she  had  got  to 
be  such  a  baby.  .  .  . 

Strange  things  had  been  happening  of  late,  it  seemed ;  strange 
memories  gathering  for  backward  thought  hereafter;  novel  pic- 

474 


PAPA  — I  WANT  TO  INTRODUCE  A  GOOD   FRIEND 
OF   MINE— DR.  VIVIAN 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

tures  ranging  in  the  immaterial  storehouse  that  opens  down  the 
years.  But  in  all  Cally's  invisible  collection,  then  or  thencefor 
ward,  there  was  never  a  scene  that  she  saw  so  vividly  as  this: 
herself  standing  silent  by  the  newel-post  in  the  wide  hall;  her 
father,  distinct  and  genial  in  the  light  through  the  open  door, 
observing  to  Mr.  V.  V.  that  hard  words  buttered  no  parsnips, 
as  the  fellow  said;  and  V.  V.,  half-smiling  at  her  over  papa's 
broad  shoulder,  and  saying  to  her  with  his  eyes  that  of  course 
this  was  the  way  it  was  meant  to  be,  all  along. 


XXXIII 

Her  Last  Day,  in  this  History ;  how  she  wakes  with  a  Wonder  in 
her  Heart,  has  her  Banquet  laid  at  the  Board  of  the  Cooneys, 
dreams  back  over  the  Long  Strange  Year  ;  finally  how  she  learns 
Something  that  not  Everybody  Knows :  what  it  is  like  at  the  End 
of  the  World. 

A  MORNING  in  October,  and  she  had  waked  to  fare  forth 
and  capture,  by  hook  or  by  crook,  the  most  eligible  parti 
who  was  ever  likely  to  swim  into  her  ken.  Another  morn 
ing  in  October,  and  all  her  waking  horizon  seemed  filled  by  the 
knowledge  that,  at  half -past  four  in  the  afternoon,  she  would  meet 
and  talk  of  cheroot  factories  with  a  man  so  little  eligible  that  he 
trusted  the  crows  to  bring  his  raiment.  In  the  wide  world  was 
there  another  person  whose  life's  pendulum,  in  a  twelvemonth, 
had  swung  so  wildly  far? 

Eight  o'clock  now,  by  the  little  clock  on  the  mantel:  eight 
hours  and  a  half  to  Mr.  Pond's  meeting  for  workers  at  the  old 
Dabney  House.  One  need  n't  be  an  astronomer  to  calculate 
that.  And  Cally  Heth  lay  wide-eyed  in  her  great  bed,  and 
thought  how  strange,  how  wonderful  is  life.  .  .  . 

In  the  watches  her  mind  had  gone  back  and  back  over  the  long 
year;  and  she  had  marvelled  at  the  tininess  of  turnings  upon 
which,  it  was  all  clear  now,  great  issues  had  hung.  She  could  put 
her  finger  on  time  after  time,  last  year  and  even  this,  when  the 
smallest  shifting  in  the  course  would  have  brought  her,  to-day, 
far  otherwhere.  'Had  she  said  that,  had  she  done  this'.  .  .  Was  it 
all  the  wild  caprice  of  Chance,  then,  that  had  no  eyes?  Were 
people  so  helpless,  the  slight  sport  of  Luck,  thistledown  blowing 
in  the  winds  of  the  gods?  Ah,  but  she  saw  clearer  than  that. 
Had  she  not  felt  all  along  how  powerfully  this  sequence  of  hap 
pening  and  encounter  had  pressed  toward  far  other  ends?  And 
the  divinity  that  had  shaped  them  at  last,  acting  and  reacting  and 

476 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

giving  circumstance  a  soul,  had  been  only  that  mysterious  di 
vinity  that  makes  human  beings  what  they  are.  There  was  truth 
in  the  saying  that  destiny  is  only  character  under  its  other 
name.  % 

No  chance  here,  surely,  that  had  waked  her  so  still  and  shining- 
eyed,  such  a  wonder  in  her  heart.  .  .  . 

She  had  marked  this  day  for  diligent  study.  Last  night  an  un 
known  hand  had  left  at  the  door  a  hard-used  copy  of  "The  New 
Factory  Idea,"  by  T.  B.  Halton.  And  Cally,  at  the  end  of  a 
second  long  business  conference  with  her  father,  had  read  three 
chapters  of  the  absorbing  work,  and  slept  upon  the  resolve  to 
devote  this  morning  to  it  altogether.  But  she  had  seen  at  the  first 
look  of  the  flooding  sunshine  upon  the  shutters,  that  she  did  not 
feel  studious  at  all.  Let  books  look  to  themselves  to-day.  Her 
desire  was  to  be  outdoors;  to  be  alone,  and  to  muse  awhile. 
Surely  nobody  ever  had  so  much,  so  much,  to  think  about. 

However,  as  a  daughter  one  wasn't  altogether  free;  nor  yet 
again  as  a  member  of  organized  society.  All  day  the  claims  of  the 
familiar  encroached  upon  the  real  world  within,  and  thoughts, 
the  radiant  aliens,  had  to  range  themselves  in  as  they  could. 

She  was  breakfasting  with  her  father.  They  were  to  forage  for 
luncheon  to-day,  these  two,  and  spoke  of  it;  he  naming  the  club, 
she  electing  her  cousins  the  Cooneys.  And  here  was  the  token  of 
the  more  cheerful  atmosphere  prevailing  this  morning  in  the 
house.  Mrs.  Heth  was  entertaining  a  lunch-party  of  seven  ladies, 
her  contemporaries,  at  two  o'clock  this  day.  True,  the  invitations 
had  been  issued  before  the  crash:  but  the  hopeful  point,  as  even 
the  servants  were  aware,  was  that  they  had  not  been  recalled. 

They  were  glad  that  mamma  felt  like  seeing  people  again ;  and 
said  so.  And  Cally  then  asked  her  father  if  he  had  any  en 
gagement  for  the  evening. 

Mr.  Heth  glanced  at  her  over  his  "Post,"  and  his  glance  feared 
that  he  saw  yet  another  conference  advancing  upon  him.  Yet,  it 
was  fair  to  say,  he  had  not  been  by  any  means  inconvincible 
about  the  new  Works.  Real  estate  was  real  estate,  say  what  you 
would;  and  it  might  be  that  the  violent  shake-up  in  the  family 

477 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

plans  had  made  the  immediate  future  of  the  business  a  somewhat 
concrete  issue. 

He  said,  guardedly  perhaps:  "To-night?  —  let's  see.... 
Well,  not  that  I  think  of  just  now." 

But  Cally  merely  wanted  to  propose  a  table  of  bridge  in  the 
library,  he  and  she  against  a  third  and  fourth.  And  papa's 
changed  expression  said  at  once  that  that  was  a  horse  of  another 
color. 

"Well,  that'd  suit  me  ...  Suit  me  first-rate." 

Their  evening  was  so  arranged.  She  warned  him  gaily  to  be 
on  his  mettle;  she  would  pick  up  two  of  the  keenest  players  to  be 
found.  Papa,  with  gathering  zest,  admitted  that  practice  was 
what  he  needed,  most  particularly  as  to  the  bids.  Had  a  rubber 
at  the  club  Saturday  night,  and  Carmichael  and  those  fellows 
took  nine  dollars  from  her  old  daddy.  .  .  . 

"Let's  make  it  a  standing  engagement,  papa  —  one  evening  a 
week,  the  same  table!  ...  Oh,  I'd  love  to!  .  .  ." 

This,  too,  seemed  remarkably  suited  to  her  father's  whim.  A 
decidedly  amiable-looking  gentleman  he  was,  with  his  fresh  color 
ing,  spotless  waistcoat  and  fine  blond  mustaches;  a  home-loving 
man,  not  much  used  to  having  parties  given  for  him. 

And  Cally  regarded  him  with  eyes  which  held  new  depths  of  af 
fection.  The  last  moment  of  the  interview  yesterday  had  brought 
an  undreamed  development,  strangely  endearing:  her  father,  in 
the  nicest  way,  had  invited  Dr.  Vivian  to  call  on  him  at  the  Works 
this  afternoon  and  see  the  plant  for  himself.  Part  of  this  perfect 
consummation  had  been  due,  without  doubt,  to  Vivian  himself ;  a 
-little,  perhaps,  to  the  direction  she  had  artfully  given  the  conver 
sation;  but  she  well  knew  that  most  of  it  had  sprung  spontane 
ously  from  the  father-love  which  had  never  failed  her  yet. .  .  . 

"And,  Cally,  hunt  up  that  book  I  saw  kicking  around  here  last 
year,"  said  Mr.  Heth,  when  he  rose.  "If  we're  going  to  do  it  at 
all,  we  might  as  well  take  the  thing  seriously,  and  get  the  bids 
straight." 

"I '11  find  it,  papa.  We  might  read  up  a  little  before  dinner.  I'm 
awfully  rusty." 

And  then  her  father  stood  by  her  chair,  pinching  her  smooth 

478 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

cheek,  looking  down  at  her  with  an  odd  expression,  half  quizzical, 
half  grave  and  speculative.  So  she  had  found  him  looking  at  her 
last  night,  as  she  sought  to  explain  to  him  how  different  Dr. 
Vivian  was  from  the  articles  he  wrote,  and  hated.  .  .  . 

"So  I'm  to  be  on  my  company  manners  with  this  young  man, 
eh?  Ask  him  won't  he  please  be  kind  enough  to  teach  an  old  man 
how  to  run  his  business,  that  it?" 

"I  did  n't  say  that,  papa  dear.  ...  I  feel  I  have  n't  thanked 
you  half  enough  for  being  so  sweet  to  me  ...  about  it  all." 

"  Rather  surprised  at  my  sweetness  myself.  .  .  .  Well,"  said 
Mr.  Heth,  musing  down  at  the  apple  of  his  eye.  "  There  must  be 
something  a  good  deal  out  of  the  common  about  a  boy  who  could 
get  you  so  worked  up  about  a  factory,  I  '11  say  that.  .  .  .  And  he 
certainly  looks  a  whole  lot  better 'n  he  writes." 

He  quoted  something  about  an  old  dog's  new  tricks,  kissed  her 
with  tenderness,  said,  "Well,  if  we  come  to  blows,  I'll  'phone  you 
for  help,"  and  went  off  humming  an  air. 

For  Cally  was  not  to  be  of  the  Works  party  this  afternoon.  It 
had  stood  as  an  ideal  opportunity  for  the  two  men's  better  ac 
quaintance;  her  presence,  she  had  thought,  might  only  mar  it. 
Now,  gazing  after  her  father's  departing  back,  she  rather  wished 
she  had  decided  otherwise.  .  .  . 

She  searched  and  found  So-and-So's  "Auction  Bridge."  A 
time  passed:  and  she  was  in  the  big  bedroom,  making  her  peace 
with  mamma. 

She  had  supposed  the  thing  to  do  was  simply  to  go  on,  as  nearly 
as  she  could,  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  But  when  she  saw  her 
mother's  face,  marked  as  from  an  illness,  she  remembered  nothing 
of  any  plan.  She  was  on  her  knees  by  the  morris-chair,  her  arms 
flung  about  the  strong  little  figure  whose  dearest  hopes  she  had 
spoiled:  begging  mamma  to  forgive  her  for  being  such  a  disap 
pointment  and  failure  as  a  daughter,  for  seeming  so  ungrateful 
and  unreasonable,  saying  that  she  would  do  anything,  anything 
to  make  up  for  all  that  had  gone  amiss. 

And  mamma,  already  somewhat  propitiated,  it  had  seemed,  by 
the  return  of  the  money,  said  presently,  with  some  emotion  of 
her  own,  that  she  would  try  to  regard  it  as  a  closed  episode. 

479 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

She,  with  her  tireless  energies,  was  not  one  to  cry  forever  over 
milk  hopelessly  spilt.  But  neither  was  she  one  to  temper  justice 
with  too  much  mercy,  and  her  final  word  on  the  matter  was  a  final 
one,  indeed:  "But  of  course  you  can  never  make  it  up  to  me,  Car 
lisle,  never  ..."  And  Carlisle,  rising,  knew  even  better  than 
mamma  how  sad  and  true  this  was.  There  was  only  one  thing  that 
her  mother  had  wanted  of  her,  and  that  thing  she  had  not  done. 
Life,  even  on  this  day  of  song  and  mist,  was  seen  to  be  inex 
orable.  .  .  . 

She  was  in  her  room  for  a  little  while,  and  it  came  to  be  eleven 
o'clock:  five  hours  and  a  half  .  .  .  While  she  unwisely  lingered 
there,  dreamily  irresolute  between  a  walk  and  a  drive,  she  was 
summoned  to  the  drawing-room  by  a  call  from  Mattie  Allen,  not 
seen  of  her  since  the  dinner  at  the  New  Arlington  last  week. 
Mattie  stayed  a  long  time  ;  and  before  she  went  —  of  course  — 
other  callers  had  drifted  in.  ... 

"Are  you  going  to  Sue  Louise's  bridge  to-night?"  demanded 
Mattie,  continuing  to  inspect  her  with  evident  curiosity. 

"Oh,  Mats!  I  forgot  all  about  it  —  horrors!  .  .  .  And  I've 
made  another  engagement!" 

"That  means  you  don't  want  to  go,  Cally.  You  know  it 
does " 

Cally  confessed  to  a  certain  want  of  enthusiasm;  asked  her 
friend  if  she,  too,  did  n't  weary  of  their  little  merry-go-round  at 
times.  Nothing  of  the  sort,  however,  would  be  admitted  by 
Mats,  who  was  now  known  to  be  having  a  really  serious  try  for 
J.  Forsythe  Avery. 

"  Dear,"  she  went  on  before  long,  "  do  you  know  you  seem  to  be 
changing  entirely  lately?  And  toward  me  specially.  ...  I  — 
I've  wondered  a  great  deal  if  I've  done  something  to  offend 
you." 

Cally  embraced  her;  spoke  with  reassuring  tenderness.  And 
there  was  compunction  in  these  endearments.  She  and  Mattie  had 
been  intimate  friends  as  long  as  she  could  remember;  and  now  it 
had  come  over  her  suddenly  that  it  would  nevermore  be  with 
them  quite  as  it  had  been  before.  Must  life  be  this  way,  that 
greetings  over  there  would  always  mean  farewells  here?  .  .  . 

480 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

And  then  Mats,  quite  mollified,  was  speaking  in  her  artless 
way  of  Hugo  Canning,  who  had  so  obviously  been  on  her  mind  all 
along. 

"People  keep  asking  me,"  she  said,  still  just  a  little  plaintive, 
"and  I  have  to  say  I  don't  know  one  thing.  It  makes  me  so 
ashamed.  They  think  I'm  not  your  best  friend  any  more." 

Cally  observed  that  all  that  was  too  absurd.  For  the  rest,  she 
seemed  somewhat  evasive. 

"I  feel,  dearie,"  said  Mats,  "that  I  ought  to  know  what  con 
cerns  your  life's  happiness.  You  don't  know  how  anxious  I've 
been  about  you  while  you  were  sick.  .  .  ."  If  there  seemed  a  tiny 
scratch  in  that,  the  next  remark  was  more  like  a  purr:  "People 
say  that  he  did  something  perfectly  terrible,  and  you  threw  him 
over." 

"Well,  Mats,  you  know  people  always  get  things  exactly 
wrong." 

"Then  you  did  n't?"  demanded  her  best  friend,  with  a  purely 
feminine  gleam. 

And  Cally,  ardently  wishing  to  be  free  of  this  subject,  said 
gaily  that  Mr.  Canning  had  thrown  her  over  —  the  second  time, 
too !  So  she  had  told  him  that  she  had  some  spirit,  that  some  day 
he  would  do  that  once  too  often.  .  .  . 

"Oh,  you're  joking,"  said  Mats,  quite  pettishly.  "Dear,  I 
don't  care  for  jokes." 

And  then,  as  she  gazed,  not  without  envy,  at  her  friend's  pro 
file,  so  strangely  sweet  and  gay,  she  exclaimed  suddenly  in  a 
shocked  tone:  "I  believe  you  really  did  do  it!" 

"Whisper  it  not  in  Gath,"  said  Cally,  with  shining  calm.  .  .  . 

It  was  a  belief,  so  mamma  had  cried  in  the  midnight,  which 
nobody  outside  of  institutions  for  the  feeble-minded  would  ever 
hold.  But  Cally  was  struck  only  with  Mattie's  enormous  seri 
ousness.  Self-reproach  filled  her  for  the  interval  that  seemed  to 
lie  between  them.  .  . . 

"Mats,  you  know  I've  never  kept  secrets  from  you.  I'll  tell 
you  everything  you  want  to  hear  about  it,  from  beginning  to 
end.  Only  —  not  to-day." 

The  kaleidoscope  shifted:  Mattie  faded  out  of  the  purview,  and 

481 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

in  her  stead  sat  the  Misses  Winton,  who  had  helped  to  pass  the 
time  in  Europe  last  year,  but  whose  presence  had  a  contrary 
effect  to-day.  And  she  wondered  how  they  could  not  see  for 
themselves  what  a  shell  of  a  hostess  they  were  talking  at.  All  her 
being  was  so  far  away  from  company:  one  half  of  her  continually 
flowing  back  over  the  months;  the  rest  always  going  forward 
to  the  afternoon,  and  beyond;  nothing  at  all  left  here.  .  .  . 

Certainly  she  would  tease  him  a  little  about  the  neat  way  he 
and  papa  had  dropped  her  out  of  the  Works.  "And  I  thought  I 
was  the  one  who  was  doing  it,  too  !  .  .  ." 

Callers  gone;  and  then  mamma,  in  the  vein  of  dignity,  was  in 
viting  her  opinion  about  the  color  scheme  of  her  luncheon-table. 
And  with  what  an  uprush  of  affection  she  responded,  what  eager 
ness  to  help,  to  be  friends  again !  .  .  .  And  then  it  was  time  for  her 
to  make  ready  for  luncheon  herself.  One-thirty  o'clock;  a  long 
day.  . .  . 

In  the  May-time,  once,  Hugo  had  asked  her  to  name  a  day,  and 
she  had  named  the  seventeenth  of  October.  And  now  the  seven 
teenth  was  here,  to-day.  Her  wedding-day  it  might  have  been, 
but  for  this  or  that :  and  behold,  her  high  banquet  was  laid  at  the 
board  of  the  Cooneys,  cold  corned  beef  and  baked  potatoes,  with 
sliced  peaches  such  as  turn  nicely  from  the  can  for  an  unex 
pected  guest. 

Cally  was  glad  to  be  with  her  cousins  to-day.  The  simple  and 
friendly  atmosphere  here  was  mightily  comfortable.  Never  had 
they  seemed  so  poor  to  her,  never  so  fine  and  merry  in  their 
poverty.  Her  heart  went  out  to  them. 

They  were  all  well  now,  the  Cooneys,  and  the  table  was  their 
clearing-house.  There  was  much  talk,  of  the  new  Works  and 
other  matters ;  great  argument.  Two  faces  were  missing :  Tee  Wee, 
who  pursued  his  studies  at  the  University,  and  Chas,  who  was 
lunching  from  a  box  at  his  desk,  snowed  under  with  work  ac 
cumulated  during  his  sickness.  In  their  places,  however,  sat 
Cousin  Martha  Heth,  who  was  described  as  "very  miserable" 
with  her  various  ailments,  but  whose  strength  at  conversation, 
regarding  symptoms,  seemed  as  the  strength  of  ten. 

Round  Cally  the  Cooney  talk  rattled  on;  family  jokes  kept 

482 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

flickering  up;  strange  catchwords  evoked  unexpected  laughter. 
The  woman  of  all  work  waited  spasmodically  upon  the  table;  she 
proved  to  be  Lugene,  none  other  than  the  girl  Hen  and  Cally  had 
found  on  Dunbar  Street,  that  day  long  ago.  .  .  .  Old  times;  so, 
too,  when  the  Major  told  with  accustomed  verve  how  papa,  a  little 
shaver  then,  had  brought  the  note  from  Aunt  Molly  down  to  camp, 
fifty  years  ago.  .  .  . 

Across  the  table  sat  Looloo,  the  best-looking  of  all  the  good- 
looking  Cooneys.  She  had  lucid  gray  eyes,  with  the  prettiest 
black  lashes;  and  Cally  found  herself  continually  looking  at 
them.  .  .  .  Strange  how  expressive  eyes  could  be,  how  revealing, 
looking  things  unspoken  that  influenced  one's  whole  life.  Im 
agine  somebody  with  eyes  something  like  Looloo's,  say,  to  have 
had  totally  different  ones;  small,  glassy  black  eyes  like  shoe- 
buttons,  for  instance,  or  to  have  worn  thick  blue-tinged  glasses, 
like  Evey's  grandmother.  .  .  . 

A  hand  waved  before  her  own  eyes;  a  voice  of  raillery  said: 
"Comeback!" 

"I'm  right  here  .  .  .  What  did  you  say?" 

"You  were  picking  flowers  ten  thousand  miles  away.  'Cause 
why?  'Not  any,  thank  you,'  is  n't  the  right  reply  to  'Please  give 
me  the  salt.'" 

"She's  in  love,"  said  the  Major,  a  gallant  in  his  day. 

Cally,  handing  the  salt  to  Hen,  said:  "I  am,  indeed,  — with 
Looloo.  Don't  you  notice  that  she  's  getting  prettier  every  day?  " 

Looloo,  fair  as  a  lily,  proved  that  blushes  made  her  prettier  still ; 
the  Major  said  finely,  "Praise  from  Sir  Hubert";  and  Aunt 
Molly,  giving  the  same  truth  a  sound  wholesome  turn,  observed 
that  Loo  need  n't  get  set  up,  for  she  'd  never  be  as  pretty  as  Cally, 
no  matter  how  she  improved. 

Cousin  Martha's  remark  was:  "But  to  go  back  to  what  I  was 
saying,  Cally.  That  Wednesday  night  was  the  worst  I  ever 
spent.  .  .  ." 

And  Cally  felt  apologetic  to  her  poor  relative  to-day,  a  good 
deal  ashamed  before  her.  Her  sudden  impulse  had  been  to  ask 
papa's  old  cousin  to  come  and  stay  in  one  of  the  four  spare 
rooms  at  home  (thus  permitting  Chas  to  come  down  from  the 

483 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

Cooney  attic) ;  but  she  had  had  to  put  that  impulse  down.  The 
Heths  had  not  built  walls  around  their  little  island  for  no 
thing  .  .  . 

They  were  in  the  limousine,  she  and  Hen,  driving  down  to 
Saltman's.  Hen  said  she  would  be  delighted  to  come  in  that  even 
ing,  and  play  bridge  with  Uncle  Thornton.  She  was  a  player  of 
known  merits,  rather  famous  for  successes  with  hare-brained  no- 
trumpers.  And  Cally,  thinking  what  man  she  should  ask  for 
Hen,  discovered  suddenly  that  her  thought  was  going  much 
beyond  a  table  of  bridge  to-night;  that  what  she  was  really 
planning  was  to  marry  her  cousin  off  this  year.  And  she  found 
herself  searching  about  for  somebody  very  nice  for  Hen,  very 
desirable. 

"Oh,  by  the  bye,"  she  said,  presently — "I  was  just  thinking — 
do  you  remember  that  corduroy  suit  I  had  last  year  —  striped 
gray,  with  a  Russian  blouse?  " 

Hen,  it  seemed,  remembered  this  suit  perfectly.  And  Cally 
said  no  wonder,  since  she  had  worn  it  till  she  would  be  ashamed 
to  be  caught  in  it  again. 

"I  was  wondering,"  said  she,  "if  you  could  make  it  do  for 
anything,  Hen.  It  would  honestly  be  a  favor  if  you'd  take 
it  off  my  hands." 

Henrietta  swept  on  her  a  look  of  incredulous  delight. 

"Cally!  .  .  .  Why,  you  good  old  bluffer!  You  know  perfectly 
well  that  suit's  a  beauty,  as  good  as  new  — " 

"No,  oh,  no!  Indeed,  it  isn't,"  said  Cally,  quite  eagerly. 
"You've  forgotten  —  it's  worn,  oh,  quite  badly  worn.  I'll  show 
you  to-night  when  you  come.  And  then  you'd  have  to  cut  it 
down,  too.  .  .  .  Only  you  must  n't  ever  wear  it  around  me,  Hen, 
I'm  really  so  sick  of  the  sight  of  it.  .  .  ." 

So  Hen  presently  said :  "  There 's  no  use  my  pretending  or  being 
coy,  Cally.  Oh,  I  'd  dearly  love  to  have  it.  I  've  been  wondering 
what  on  earth  I  'd  do  for  a  nice  suit  this  year.  .  .  .  Why,  it 's  like 
an  answer  to  prayer.  ..." 

And  what  had  she  ever  done  in  a  human  world  to  entitle  her 
to  be  bestowing  last-year's  suits  upon  Henrietta  Cooney,  the 
busy  and  useful?  "She's  worth  three  of  me,"  thought  Cally, 

484 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

" and  I've  been  looking  down  on  her  all  this  time  just  because 
they're  poor.  I  seem  to  be  little  and  mean  clear  through,  ..." 
And  suddenly  she  saw  that  memories  had  been  gathering  here; 
that  Saltman's  hard- worked  stenographer  had  grown  intimate 
and  dear.  .  .  . 

Her  hand  closed  over  Hen's,  and  she  was  speaking  hurriedly: 

"Hen,  do  you  know  you're  a  great  old  dear?  Don't  look  .  .  . 
I've  never  told  you  how  good  you  were  to  me  this  summer, 
when  I  was  so  unhappy,  and  nobody  else  seemed  to  care.  .  .  . 
And  since  I  've  been  back,  too,  helping  me  more  than  you  know, 
perhaps.  I  did  n't  appreciate  it  all  at  the  time,  quite,  but  I  do 
now.  And  I  won't  forget  what  a  good  friend  you've  been  to  me, 
what  an  old  trump " 

Hen,  taken  quite  by  surprise,  turned  on  her  a  somewhat  misty 
gaze.  She  answered  that  Cally  was  a  darling  goose;  with  other 
things  solacing  and  sweet.  And  then  the  two  cousins  were  part 
ing,  the  one  to  her  typewriter,  the  other  to  her  ease:  but  both 
feeling  that  a  new  tie  bound  them  which  would  not  loosen  soon. 

The  car  started  from  Saltman's  door,  and  Cally  glanced  at  her 
watch:  it  was  just  three  o'clock.  Probably  at  this  moment  Dr. 
Vivian  and  papa  were  shaking  hands  in  the  office  at  the  Works. 
Why,  oh,  why,  had  n't  she  said  that  she  would  go,  too,  as  she  had 
so  much  wanted  to  do?  Surely  she  could  not  have  harmed  that 
meeting;  she  might  even  have  helped  a  little. 

About  her  were  the  bustle  and  clangor  of  busy  Centre  Street. 
People  hurrying  upon  a  thousand  errands,  each  intent  upon  his 
own  business,  under  the  last  wrapping  each  soul  alone  in  the 
crowded  world.  And  no  one  knew  of  his  brother's  high  adven 
tures.  Men  walked  brushing  elbows  with  angels,  and  un 
aware.  .  .  . 

She  had  had  a  little  sister  named  Rosemary,  two  years  older 
than  she,  and  very  lovely  in  the  little  picture  of  her  that  papa 
always  carried  in  the  locket  on  his  watch-chain.  Often  Cally  had 
wished  for  her  sister;  never  so  much  as  through  this  day.  There 
was  one,  she  liked  to  think,  whom  she  could  have  talked  her 
heart  out  to,  sure  that  she  would  understand  all,  share  all.  But 
Rosemary  had  been  dead  these  twenty  years.  .  .  t 

485 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


"Drive  me  a  little,  William,  please  .  .  .  For  half  an  hour,  and 
then  home.  ..." 

The  car  went  far  over  familiar  streets  that  she  had  first  seen 
from  a  perambulator.  She  sat  almost  motionless,  the  tangible 
world  faded  out.  It  was  good  to  be  alone;  this  was  a  solitude 
peopled  with  fancies.  Her  mind  dreamed  back  over  the  long 
strange  year,  while  her  steadfast  face  was  shining  toward  the 
Future. 

Strange  enough  it  seemed  now;  but  till  the  other  day  Hugo  and 
Dr.  Vivian  had  hardly  once  met  in  the  thoughts  of  Cally  Heth. 
They  had  hardly  met  in  life,  never  exchanged  a  word  since  the 
night  in  the  summer-house:  so  she,  untrained  to  discernment,  had 
supposed  that  they  had  nothing  to  do  with  each  other.  Now,  in 
the  last  few  days,  it  had  come  to  seem  that  these  two  had,  in 
her,  been  pitted  against  each  other  from  the  beginning. 

Forces  not  of  her  making  had  cut  and  patterned  her  life;  and 
she,  driven  on  by  feelings  which  she  herself  had  hardly  under 
stood,  had  crumpled  up  that  pattern  and  seized  the  shears  of 
destiny  in  her  own  hand.  The  groove  she  had  been  set  and 
clamped  so  fast  into  ran  straight  as  a  string  into  Hugo  Canning's 
arms;  but  she  had  broken  out  of  her  groove,  and  Hugo  was  gone, 
to  cross  her  path  no  more.  And  her  mother  thought,  and  Hugo 
had  said  almost  with  his  parting  breath,  that  she  had  been 
driven  to  these  madnesses  by  mere  foolish  femininisms,  new  lit 
tle  ideas  picked  up  from  Cooneys  or  elsewhere. 

It  was  true  that  she  had  these  ideas;  true,  too,  that  she  was  not 
alone  with  them.  She  had  been  drilled  from  birth  to  the  ranks  of 
the  beguilers  of  men,  their  sirens  but  their  inferiors;  and  some 
thing  in  her,  even  before  this  year,  had  rebelled  at  that  rating  of 
herself,  dimly  perceiving  —  as  she  had  heard  a  man  say  once  — 
that  marriage  was  better  regarded  as  a  calling  than  as  a  means  of 
livelihood.  She  had  been  drilled  again  to  believe  that  her  happi 
ness  depended  on  money  in  quantities,  things  had;  but  then,  at 
the  first  pinch  of  real  trouble,  these  things  had  seemed  to  sag  be 
neath  her,  and  she  perceived,  dimly  once  more,  that  she  had  built 
her  house  upon  something  like  sand.  And  if  her  particular  experi- 

486 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

ences  here  had  been  unique,  she  had  seen  that  her  experience  was, 
after  all,  a  common  one.  As  if  with  eyes  half-opened,  she  had  di 
vined  all  about  her  other  people  making  the  discoveries  she  had 
made;  or,  better  yet,  knowing  these  truths  without  having  to  dis 
cover  them.  She  was  but  one  of  a  gathering  company,  men  as 
well  as  women,  old  with  young.  .  .  . 

Hugo  had  stood  rock-like  across  the  way  she  was  moving.  And 
so  Hugo  had  lost  her. 

But  these  things  seemed  hardly  to  matter  now;  it  all  went 
down  so  much  deeper.  Surely  it  was  over  something  bigger  than 
her  "little  views"  that  her  story-book  prince  had  locked  arms 
with  the  lame  slum  doctor,  curiously  recognized  by  him  as  an 
adversary  at  sight. 

They  had  entered  her  life  in  almost  the  same  hour,  two  men  so 
different  that  she  had  come  at  last  to  see  them  as  full  opposites. 
So  entering  together,  they  had  both  become  involved  with  her  in 
the  first  moral  problem  of  her  life,  which  also  began  in  that 
hour.  And  upon  that  problem  each  had  been  called,  in  turn,  to 
ring  his  mettle.  One,  the  fine  flower  of  her  own  world,  with  a 
high  respect  for  that  world's  opinions  and  on  the  whole  a  low  es 
teem  of  the  worth  of  a  woman,  had  found  her  completely  satis 
fying  as  she  was.  The  other,  a  wanderer  from  some  other 
planet,  with  his  strange  indifference  to  the  world's  values  and 
his  extraordinary  hope  of  everything  human,  had  been  so  pas 
sionately  dissatisfied  with  her  that  he,  a  kind  man  surely,  had 
broken  out  in  speech  that  had  left  a  scar  upon  her  memory.  And 
upon  the  stranger's  shocking  appraisement  of  her,  there  had, 
indeed,  hung  a  tale. 

There  were  times  when  it  had  seemed  that  everything  she  had 
done  afterwards  had  been  but  stages  of  an  effort,  months  pro 
longed,  to  shake  herself  free  from  that  compassionate  God  pity 
you.  .  .  . 

But  no;  she  knew  it  was  not  that  way  exactly.  Before  that 
night  she  had  felt  vague  Teachings  and  had  put  them  down; 
and  similarly  afterwards.  Buttressed  about  with  her  island's 
social  security,  strong  in  her  woman's  faculty  for  believing 
what  she  needed  to  believe,  she  could  easily  persuade  herself, 

487 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 

or  almost,  that  there  had  been  only  an  unfortunate  misunder 
standing  about  Jack  Dalhousie,  that  she  personally  had  n't 
done  anything  at  all.  She  remembered  that  she  had  all  but 
put  the  matter  where  it  would  trouble  her  no  more.  And  then 
there  had  come  a  night  when  she  saw  that  the  stranger,  by  a 
certain  gentleness  and  trust  there  were  in  him,  had  not  been 
able  to  believe  his  own  hard  words  of  her.  This  man  believed 
that  she  was  good;  believed  it  because  he  himself  was  good.  And 
the  moment  of  that  revelation  had  been  terrible  to  her.  She  had 
felt  in  Hen's  parlor  the  smart  of  coals  of  fire,  the  strange,  new 
shame  of  being  trusted,  but  untrustworthy.  So  there  had  en 
tered  her  a  guilty  disquiet:  and  afterwards,  however  she  had 
struggled,  however  Hugo's  protecting  strength  had  compassed 
her  about,  that  novel  sense  had  kept  growing  through  the 
months,  steadily  gathering  momentum.  .  .  . 

All  this  was  quite  clear  to  her  now.  Nothing  had  made  her 
tell  the  truth  about  Jack  Dalhousie  except  that  one  man  had 
expected  her  to.  Of  all  that  had  happened  to  her,  here  was  the 
beating  heart. 

No  one  in  her  life  had  met  her  on  this  ground  before.  She  had 
been  expected  to  be  a  charming  woman  if  she  could,  a  woman 
as  ornamental  as  possible.  He  only  had  expected  her  to  be 
a  good  woman;  and  something  in  her  had  found  the  strange 
call  irresistible.  He,  by  the  trusting  eyes  he  had,  had  put  her 
upon  her  honor;  not  her  "woman's  honor,"  but  her  honor; 
and  she,  who  had  never  had  an  honor  before,  had  grown  one,  all 
for  him.  As  long  as  she  could  remember,  men  had  paid  tribute  to 
her  in  all  the  ways  of  men  with  maids.  But  he  alone  had  put 
any  trust  in  her  as  a  free  and  moral  being;  and  she  had  bent 
the  high  heavens  and  all  but  broken  her  mother's  heart  that  he 
should  not  have  trusted  her  in  vain. 

She  was  far,  far  from  being  a  good  woman.  Hugo  certainly 
was  anything  but  a  bad  man.  Yet,  when  all  was  said,  it  was  her 
expanding  desire  to  be  good  that  Hugo  had  stood  against.  And 
the  collision  had  destroyed  him. 

Was  this  the  great  mystery  then,  the  world's  secret?  Was 
this  the  wish  that  each  human  being  had,  planted  away  in  the 

488 


V.    V. 's     Eyes 


deeps,  overlaid  and  choked,  forgotten,  yet  charged  with  om 
nipotence:  the  wish  to  be  good?  Were  they  all  waiting  for 
somebody  to  pass  by,  sounding  the  secret  call,  to  drop  all  and 
follow?  .  .  . 

Oh,  wonder,  wonder,  that  the  simple  faith  of  one  good  man 
should  have  power  to  overthrow  princes  and  powers!  .  .  . 

The  car  rolled  swiftly,  its  windows  open  to  the  sunny  day.  All 
about  were  the  sights  and  noises  of  city  streets.  But  the  flying 
panorama  brought  no  distraction:  out  there,  men  walked  as  trees. 
There  blew  a  light  autumn  wind,  gently  kicking  at  Cally's  veil, 
waving  tendrils  of  fine  hair  about  her  face.  Unaware,  suffering 
had  laid  its  touch  upon  her;  this  face  was  lovely  with  a  deeper 
meaning:  and  yet  the  young  girl's  April-freshness  clung  to  her 
still.  She  was  in  the  first  exquisite  bloom  of  her  womanhood.  And 
she  sat  very  still  in  the  rolling  car,  full  of  a  breathless  wonder  at 
the  miracle  of  life. 

It  had  been  the  year  of  her  spirit's  Odyssey.  And  now,  when 
she  came  at  last  to  fair  haven,  marvel  fell  upon  marvel :  and  the 
quest  of  her  heart  stood  saluting  her  from  the  shore.  What 
need  had  she  to  ponder  or  to  justify,  she  who,  setting  out  to 
find  happiness  upon  the  shining  earth,  had  so  strangely  found 
it  among  the  yet  more  shining  stars? 

Very  slowly,  very  delicately,  had  knowledge  unfolded  within 
her.  On  a  day  there  had  been  pain,  and  nothing.  On  a  day 
there  had  been  thrilling  peace,  and  luminous  wings  beating  so 
strong,  so  sure.  .  .  . 

To  love;  to  love  unasked  .  .  . 

She  knew  that  women  thought  this  a  shame  to  them;  she  had 
thought  it  so  herself.  Yet  could  it  be?  Had  he  not  taught  her 
this,  or  nothing,  that  to  give  was  ever  a  finer  thing  than  to 
take?  Was  it  a  shame  to  love  what  was  lovable,  and  fine  and 
beautiful  and  sweet?  Ah,  no;  surely  the  shame  for  her  would  be, 
knowing  these  things  now  at  their  value,  not  to  love  them,  to 
hold  back  thriftily  for  the  striking  of  a  bargain.  Was  not  here, 
and  no  otherwhere,  the  true  badge  of  the  inferior,  to  measure 
the  dearest  beats  of  one's  heart  as  a  prudent  trader  measures? 

So  Cally  Heth,  the  often  loved  and  lovely,  was  strong  to  feel 

489 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

on  her  wonderful  day.  Beneath  the  maiden's  invincible  reserve, 
under  the  mad  sweetness  of  this  unrest,  clear  upon  that  Future 
which  was  so  enveloped  in  a  golden  haze,  she  felt  a  pride  in  her 
own  human  worthiness,  as  one  who  now  does  the  best  thing  of 
her  life.  She  had  always  wanted  to  love  above  her:  how  time 
and  this  man  had  invested  her  ideal  with  a  richer  meaning !  .  .  . 
Was  not  this  the  touchstone  of  that  change  within  herself  she 
had  sought,  that  day  when  Colonel  Dalhousie's  rod  had  chast 
ened  her? 

Many  symbols  of  happiness  had  shone  and  beckoned  about 
her,  and  she  had  turned  her  back  on  all  of  them  to  follow  a  man 
in  a  patched  coat  whose  power  was  only  that  he  spoke  simply  of 
God,  and  believed  in  the  goodness  of  his  fellows.  Over  the  gulf 
that  lay  between  their  worlds,  this  man  had  called  to  her:  and 
now  she  had  made  him  her  last  full  response,  which  was  herself. 
He  was  the  saint  in  her  life;  and  she  had  found  him  beneath  all 
disguises,  and  laid  her  heart  at  his  feet. 

Home  again;  dreams  laid  by.  There  was  action  for  a  space. 
Anticipation  painted  the  world  in  rose. 

It  was  after  four,  by  the  clock  on  the  mantel.  Cally  stood  at 
the  window,  dressed,  waiting.  She  was  bound  for  a  workers' 
meeting  in  a  somewhat  dilapidated  Settlement  House  in  the 
slums,  which  only  the  other  day  had  been  an  abandoned  hotel, 
for  cause.  And  never  in  her  vivid  life  had  she  dressed  with 
greater  care.  .  .  . 

She  gazed  down,  upon  a  street  which  she  did  not  see.  Ten 
minutes  past  four:  but  twenty  minutes  more,  out  of  the  long 
day.  By  now,  he  had  already  left  the  Works  for  the  Dabney 
House.  .  .  .  And  she  was  thinking  that  never  but  once  had  he 
made  a  personal  remark  to  her:  when  he  had  thought,  among 
the  hard  things,  that  she  was  lovely  to  the  eye.  But  all  that 
was  a  long,  long  time  ago.  .  .  . 

From  the  door  below  there  issued  her  mother's  guests,  depart 
ing.  Two  strolled  away  up  the  afternoon  street;  one  drove  off 
in  an  open  car;  two  stepped  into  an  old-fashioned  family  car 
riage.  Then,  after  a  little  interval,  Mrs.  Heth  herself  came  out 

490 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

with  two  more  women;  and  these  three  drove  away  in  the  Byrd 
car,  which  had  been  observed  waiting  down  there. 

Cally  was  alone  in  the  house.  And  it  was  good  to  be 
alone. 

There  whizzed  up,  from  the  opposite  direction,  yet  another 
car,  jerking  to  a  standstill  at  the  door.  It  caught  the  girl's  notice; 
her  vague  thought  was  that  it  was  William,  come  a  little  early. 
But  she  saw  at  once  that  this  was  a  strange  vehicle,  a  hired  one 
by  the  look  of  it,  and  consciousness  dreamed  out  of  her  eyes 
again.  .  .  . 

The  tide  of  her  being  pulsed  strong  within  her  now.  All  day  her 
strange  feeling  was  as  if  an  enveloping  shell  had,  somewhere  lately, 
been  chipped  from  about  her,  revealing  to  her  half-startled  gaze 
a  horizon  far  wider  than  any  guessed  before.  By  the  new  sum- 
monings  that  made  music  in  her  heart,  by  these  undreamed 
aspirations  and  reaching  affections,  there  was  the  thrilling 
seeming  that  always  heretofore  she  had  lived  in  some  dull  half- 
deadness.  And  she  could  not  doubt  that  this  port  where  she  had 
arrived  at  last  was  no  other  than  the  gate  of  Life.  .  .  . 

"Why,  that's  Chas  Cooney!"  said  Cally,  suddenly,  gazing 
down. 

From  the  cab  below  there  had  stepped  a  tall  young  man,  out 
upon  her  sidewalk.  She  recognized  her  cousin  with  instant  sur 
prise;  and  consciousness,  returning  to  her  again,  set  a  little  frown 
between  her  level  brows.  Chas  made  her  think  at  once  of  the 
Works.  How  was  it  that  he,  so  busy  that  he  could  not  even  stop 
for  dinner,  came  driving  up  here  in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon? 
Above  all,  who  was  it  that  he  was  helping,  so  slowly  and  care 
fully,  from  his  hired  car? 

The  girl  gazed  with  growing  tensity;  her  hat-brim  pressed  the 
window.  The  downward  view  was  unimpeded,  all  clear;  only, 
things  moved  so  slowly.  However,  a  little  at  a  time,  the  second 
person  in  the  car  came  emerging  into  the  sunshine. 

And  Cally's  heart  lifted  with  an  appalling  wrench  as  she  saw 
that  it  was  her  father. 

There  had  been  an  accident  at  the  Works:  that  was  clear  in  one 
eye-sweep.  Her  father  had  been  hurt.  He  was  bare-headed;  a 

49 1 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


long  splotch  ran  up  his  cheek,  into  his  hair.  He  was  dragging  over 
the  sidewalk,  leaning  heavily  upon  Chas's  arm.  One  of  his  own 
arms  hung  unnaturally  still  at  his  side.  More  horrible  than  any  of 
these  things  was  his  face,  so  ghastly  green  in  the  light. 

And  in  the  watcher  at  the  window,  life  shocked  instantly  to 
death.  For  in  the  flash  in  which  she  saw  her  father's  face,  she 
knew.  No  need  of  speech;  no  more  news  to  break.  Had  she  not 
felt  that  something  terrible  would  happen  at  the  Works  some  day? 
There  had  happened  a  thing  more  terrible  than  all  her  nightmares 
had  devised.  .  .  . 

She  did  not  remember  going  downstairs  at  all.  But  she  must 
have  gone  down  very  fast,  for  when  she  opened  the  door  the  two 
men  were  just  stepping  into  the  vestibule,  Chas's  hand  reaching 
out  toward  the  bell.  .  .  . 

One  look  went  between  her  and  papa.  Did  he  see  death  in  her 
face? 

"You  heard  ..."  he  said,  standing  there,  his  voice  so  curi 
ous.  And  she  could  have  screamed  for  that  look  in  his  eyes. 

"No,"  said  CaUy.  Yet  surely  she  had  heard. 

He  was  limping  through  the  door  toward  her;  dirt  on  his 
:lothes;  dark  stains  on  his  fine  snowy  waistcoat.  And  then  his 
arm  was  hard  round  her  neck;  papa's  head  buried  upon  her 
breast,  like  a  sorry  boy's. 

"My  poor  little  girl." 

So  there  had  been  a  glimmer  within,  after  all.  It  went  out, 
with  a  mortal  throe.  All  was  black. 

But  surely  this  was  quite,  quite  unreal;  but  one  more  horror  of 
the  night,  the  last  and  the  worst.  Ah,  surely,  surely,  she  had  but 
to  make  one  great  effort  to  find  herself  sitting  up  in  the  dark; 
trembling,  but  alive. 

"How  badly  are  you  hurt?" 

"Nothing.  .  .  .  Arm's  broke.  ...  No  one  else." 

Then  they  were  standing  in  the  wide  dim  hall.  The  door  was 
shut,  and  she  was  holding  by  the  knob.  And  she  heard  a  voice, 
so  small,  so  strangely  calm. 

"How  did  it  happen,  papa?  " 

Papa  had  his  sound  arm  raised,  his  hand  rubbing  vaguely 

492 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

at  his  lips.  But  it  was  not  his  own  pain  and  shock  that  had 
bleached  those  lips  so  white. 

"Floor  crashed  in  —  without  warning  ...  broke  through. 
He  'd  made  a  suggestion  —  some  braces.  So  I  took  him  up  to 
look.  We  were  standing  there  .  .  .  standing  underneath.  Stand 
ing  there,  talking.  And  the  floor  gave  way  .  .  .  cracked  .  .  . 
caved  in  on  us.  One  machine  came  down.  .  .  ." 

The  voice,  too,  seemed  to  cave  in.  And  some  one  was  squeez 
ing  her  hand,  very  hard. 

So  nothing  was  wanting  from  the  finished  picture,  not  the  last 
exquisite  stroke.  He,  the  believer,  had  believed  even  in  her 
father's  floors.  It  was  she  who  had  doubted,  she  who  had  asked 
the  help  that  never  failed.  Had  he  not  told  her  not  to  worry?  .  .  . 

But  if  only  she  had  n't  stopped  going  inside.  If  only  her 
heart  would  soon  begin  to  beat  again.  .  .  . 

Chas  Cooney  was  winking  his  keen  eyes. 

"He'd  got  clear  —  there  was  plenty  of  time.  .  .  .  One  of  the 
negro  women  was  knocked  over  by  a  flying  splinter  .  .  .  Things 
were  falling  all  around.  So  he  stopped  for  her*.  .  .  .  She  was  n't 
hurt  at  all,  when  we  pulled  her  out.  ...  Of  course  Uncle  Thorn 
ton  was  back  in  it  all.  A  beam  knocked  him  senseless  ..." 

"Surgeon  said  it  was  instantaneous,"  came  papa's  shadowy 
voice.  "Well.  ...  It's  on  my  head.  I'm  responsible.  I  know 
that." 

And  he  sat  down  uncertainly,  and  somewhat  pitifully,  on  the 
tall  hall-chair.  .  .  . 

Then  nobody  said  anything  more.  There  would  never  be  any 
thing  more  to  say.  Time  would  go  on  a  long  while  yet,  but  no 
one  would  ever  add  another  touch  here.  This  was  the  end  of  the 
world. 

He  had  trusted  the  Heths  too  far. 

And  how  strange  and  void  it  was  at  the  world's  end,  how  deadly 
still  but  for  the  faint  roarings  of  waters  far  off. 

She  was  walking  toward  her  father.  Through  the  roaring 
there  came  a  voice,  so  little  and  so  remote. 

"Papa,  you  must  come  up  to  bed.  ...  I'll  telephone  for  the 
doctor." 

493 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 


But  she  did  not  go  to  the  telephone;  not  even  to  her  father. 
She  brushed  her  hand  upward  vaguely,  fending  away  the  ad 
vancing  blackness.  And  then  it  would  have  been  with  her  as 
with  poor  Miller  that  day  at  the  Works,  but  that  Charles 
Cooney,  who  had  been  watching  her  closely,  was  quick  and 
strong. 


XXXIV 

In  which  to  love  much  is  to  be  much  loved,  and  Kern's  Dearest 
Dream  (but  one)  comes  True. 

BEYOND  the  Great  Gulf,  there  was  news  coming,  too: 
coming  with  the  click  of  hoofs  on  cobble-stones,  and  the 
harsh  clanging  of  a  wagon;  seeping  and  spreading  through 
the  shabby  street  with  mysterious  velocity.  Windows  rattled 
up;  a  word  flew  from  lip  to  lip;  people  were  running. 

There  came  the  Reverend  George  Dayne,  of  the  Charities,  and 
hard  behind  him  Labor  Commissoner  O'Neill,  mopping  his  face 
as  he  ran.  These  two  were  known  to  the  neighborhood,  with 
their  right  of  going  in,  and  no  questions  asked.  Out  again  came 
the  ambulance  surgeon,  shaking  his  head  jauntily  at  all  inquiries. 
Out  lastly,  after  an  interval,  issued  Mr.  Pond,  and  disappeared 
into  the  establishment  of  Henry  Bloom,  who  was  known  to 
have  loaned  his  camp-chairs  free,  the  day  Doctor  got  up  this  here 
Settlement.  .  .  . 

Then  stillness  enveloped  all.  Nothing  seemed  to  stir.  And 
no  one  could  remember  when  he  had  seen  those  windows  dark 
before. 

Within,  upstairs,  the  two  men,  alike  only  in  this  one  tie,  stood 
about,  waiting;  waiting  for  Pond's  return;  waiting  only  because 
they  were  loath  to  go.  What  little  had  been  for  their  hands  to 
do*was  done  now. 

The  men  of  the  yellow  wagon,  breathing  hard  as  they  came 
up  the  steps,  had  sought  out  the  bedroom.  But  Mr.  Dayne 
said  that  a  soldier  should  lie  in  his  tent.  So  they  had  made  sure 
that  the  three-legged  lounge  in  the  office  was  steady,  and  got  a 
fresh  counterpane  from  red-lidded  Mrs.  Garland.  Then,  when 
Pond  was  gone,  the  other  two  had  thought  to  make  ready 
against  the  arrival  of  Bloom.  However,  they  were  soon  brought 
to  pause  here,  finding  nothing  to  make  ready  with.  There  was 

495 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

an  overcoat  hung  in  the  clothes  closet,  but  otherwise  it  was  en 
tirely  bare;  hangers  dangling  empty.  The  men  had  found  the 
sight  somewhat  sad. 

But  Mr.  Dayne,  who  had  been  a  parson  before  he  was  a  Secre 
tary,  had  said  no  matter.  Let  him  go  in  his  patches  upon  his 
great  adventure.  .  .  . 

It  had  seemed  natural  to  these  two  to  be  doing  the  last  small 
services.  There  was  no  family  here;  friends'  love  was  needed. 
But  now  there  was  only  waiting.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Dayne,  in  Canal  Street  in  his  own  business,  had  been  at 
the  Heth  Works  in  the  first  uproar.  At  intervals,  he  had  told 
the  story  to  the  others:  a  story  of  one  machine  too  many  un 
loaded  on  a  strained  floor;  of  a  dry  beam  breaking  with  a  report 
like  a  cannon;  of  men  and  women  stampeding  in  the  wild  fear 
that  the  building  was  about  to  collapse.  On  the  second  floor, 
but  two  had  kept  their  heads;  and  the  young  doctor,  for  all  his 
bad  foot,  had  been  the  quicker.  It  was  supposed  that  the  base 
of  the  machine  itself  had  struck  him,  glancing.  Mr.  Heth,  found 
two  feet  away,  was  buried  by  a  litter  of  debris;  his  escape  from 
death  was  deemed  miraculous.  And  when  they  brought  him 
round,  it  was  told  that  his  first  word  had  been:  "Vivian 
hurt?..." 

Much  remained  puzzling:  in  chief  the  strange  amiability  of 
the  master  of  the  Works  toward  the  man  he  had  once  threatened 
to  break  for  libel.  They  had  stood  there  chatting  like  friends, 
laughing. 

But  here  Commissioner  O'Neill  could  give  little  light.  Last 
night  his  friend  had  told  him,  indeed,  with  evidences  of  strange 
happinesss,  that  there  was  to  be  a  new  Heth  Works  at  once. 
But  he  was  mysteriously  reserved  as  to  how  this  triumph  for  the 
O'Neill  administration  had  been  brought  to  pass,  saying  re 
peatedly:  "It's  a  sort  of  secret.  I  can't  tell  you  that,  old  fellow." 
But  O'Neill  remembered  now  one  thing  he  had  said,  with  quite 
an  excited  air,  which  might  be  a  sort  of  clue:  "Don't  you  get 
it,  Sam?  ...It's  all  good.  Everybody 's  good  .  .  .  Why,  I  've 
known  it  all  the  time."  . .  . 

Now  the  two  men  had  fallen  silent,  They  were  jn  the  old 

496 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


waiting-room,  with  the  office  door  fast  shut  between.  Royalty 
had  slept  in  this  room  once.  It  was  decaying  now,  and  bare  as 
your  hand  but  for  the  row  of  kitchen  chairs  along  the  wall.  The 
minister  kept  walking  about;  kept  humming  beneath  his  breath. 
Once  Sam  O'Neill  caught  a  line  of  that  song:  The  victory  of  life 
is  won.  A  strange  sentiment  at  this  time  certainly;  thoroughly 
clerical,  though.  It  was  a  professional  matter  with  Dayne; 
only  he,  O'Neill,  had  been  really  close  to  V.  V.  And  he  was 
continually  burdened  with  a  certain  sense  of  personal  responsi 
bility  for  it  all.  ... 

"I'd  like  to  have  the  doctor  for  that  little  girl  in  there,"  said 
Mr.  Dayne. 

The  Commissioner,  who  was  getting  really  stout  these  days, 
cleared  his  throat. 

"How's  she  goin'  to  get  on  without  him?" 

"Ah,  how?"  said  the  clergyman,  musing. 

The  stillness  was  like  the  silence  before  the  dawn.  Oppressive, 
too,  was  the  sense  of  emptiness.  Two  men  in  this  chamber;  one 
small  watcher  beyond  the  door;  otherwise  emptiness,  sensed 
through  all  the  two  hundred  rooms  of  the  deserted  pile.  Life 
died  from  the  world.  People  forgot.  Stillness,  death,  loneli 
ness,  and  destitution.  They  had  picked  him  to  the  bone,  and 
left  him 

And  then,  as  thoughts  like  these  saddened  the  thoughts  of 
the  two  men,  there  was  heard  as  it  were  the  whir  of  wings  in 
his  old  hotel.  And  the  crows  came. 

I  say  the  crows  came.  They  came  in  their  own  way;  but  so 
they  had  always  come.  Came  in  the  guise  of  an  elderly  tramp, 
vacant-eyed  and  straggly-bearded,  soiled,  tentative,  and  reluc 
tant.  But  what  mattered  things  like  this:  since  in  his  wings, 
which  were  only  hairy  arms  that  needed  soap,  he  brought  the 
raiment  ?  Such  a  pile  of  them,  too,  such  royal  abundance.  A 
fine  black  cutaway  coat,  a  handsome  pair  of  "extra"  trousers, 
shirts,  and  shoes,  and,  peeping  beneath  all,  glimpses  of  a  pretty 
blue  suit  quite  obviously  as  good  as  new. 

There  stood  the  wonder,  silent  and  uncouth,  in  the  doorway. 
Do  you  doubt  that  Sam  O'Neill  and  Mr.  Dayne  knew,  the 

497 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

moment  their  eyes  saw,  that  here  were  the  crows  come?  How 
they  gazed  and  gazed,  and  how  poor  Mister  Garland,  ever  retir 
ing  of  habit,  squirmed  and  shifted  over  an  uneasy  heart.  .  .  . 

He  did  not  care  to  talk  with  gentlemen,  did  Mister;  gentle 
men  of  that  cloth  particularly.  Doubt  not  that  in  institutions 
men  wearing  such  vests  as  this  had  had  their  cleanly  will  of  him 
on  winter  nights.  So  he  asked  his  question  dumbly,  with  a  move 
ment  of  matted  head  and  eyebrow;  and  when  Mr.  Dayne  an 
swered  in  a  curious  voice,  "Yes  ...  he's  gone,"  the  last  ex 
pectancy  faded  from  the  rough  vague  face.  He  sidled  in,  timid 
and  unwilling;  laid  his  burden,  speechless,  upon  a  chair.  And 
then  he  was  shambling  furtively  out  the  door  again,  when  the 
parson's  hand  took  his  shoulder. 

"Why  are  you  bringing  them  back  now?  He  gave  them  all 
to  you,  didn't  he?" 

The  visitor  spoke  for  the  first  time,  suddenly,  low  and  whin 
ing. 

"'S  a  Gawd's  truth,  Reverend,  I  never  hooked  nothin'  off 
him,  an'  I  was  goin'  to  bring  'em  back  anyways.  Nothin'  wore 
at  all,  gents,  you  can  see  yourself,  cep  a  time  or  two  mebbe 
outen  that  there  derby.  ..." 

The  man  himself  could  see  no  point  in  it  all  except  that  gents 
had  him  in  charge;  a  threatening  predicament.  But  Mr.  Dayne's 
gentle  suasion  prevailed.  Out,  gradually,  came  the  little  story 
which  he  was  to  tell  sometimes  in  after  years,  and  think  about 
oftener.  .  .  . 

Mister  was  bringing  back  Doctor's  things  because  he  had  never 
felt  right  about  taking  them. 

The  cutaway  coat  had  been  the  beginning  of  it  all,  it  seemed 
The  gift  of  so  fine  a  Sunday  coat  had  bewildered  the  recipient ; 
he  had  been  on  the  point  of  handing  it  back  right  there.  How 
ever,  nature  had  conquered,  then  and  subsequently;  there  had 
accumulated  a  collection  of  clothing  secretly  laid  away  in  a  place 
he  had.  The  man  had  kept  asking,  he  said,  out  of  habit  — 
"more  jest  to  see  if  he'd  give  'em  to  yer  like."  But  he  seemed 
to  feel,  in  a  certain  dim  way,  that  there  was  a  sort  of  contest 
on  between  him  and  Doctor. 

498 


V.    V.  's     Eyes 

"The  innercent  look  he  had  to  him,  yer  might  say,"  he  said, 
groping  for  words  to  answer  the  high- vested  inquisitor.  "Like  a 
child  like.  Never  scolded  yer  wunst  .  .  .  Just  up  and  give  yer  all 
yer  wanted.  ..." 

The  blue  suit,  given  yesterday,  seemed  to  have  been  conceived 
as  a  kind  of  test  case.  The  man  appeared  to  feel  that,  once  refused, 
a  sort  of  spell  on  him  would  be  broken ;  he  would  then  get  out  all 
his  store  and  wear  them  freely.  So  he  had  told  a  tall  story  in  the 
office:  how  he  was  surely  going  to  settle  down  and  be  respectable 
this  time,  and  was  obliged  to  have  him  a  good  nice  suit  fer  to  git 
started  in.  ...  And  Doctor  had  given  him  such  a  funny  look 
that  for  a  minute  he  thought  sure  he  had  him.  But  no,  the 
young  man  had  laughed  suddenly,  as  at  a  joke,  and  said:  "Well, 
you  sit  there,  Mister,  till  I  take  these  off  ..."  Only  not  to 
tell  Mrs.  Garland.  Took  him  right  back,  sure  did.  .  .  . 

"So  then  I  thinks,"  said  Mister,  the  professional  quaver  re 
turning  to  his  voice,  "it's  no  better  'n  thievin'  for  to  take  off  an 
innercent  like  him,  and  thinks  I,  I'll  git  the  lot  of  'em,  and  give 
him  like  a  surprise.  'S  a  Gawd's  truth,  gents,  like  I  'm  tellin'  yer. 
Nothin'  at  all  wore  but  mebbe  that  there  derby,  like  I  up  and 
tole  yer  .  .  ." 

His  word  had  never  been  doubted:  this  passed  invention. 
And  he  was  thanked,  not  chidden  for  his  narrative,  and  Rev 
erend  said: 

"He  shall  wear  that  suit  for  his  burial.  .  .  ." 

So  the  crows  flitted  out  of  the  door  again,  their  errand  done; 
and  behind  them  was  a  deeper  stillness  than  they  had  found. 

The  old  waiting-room,  a  little  dark  at  best,  grew  dimmer.  Sun 
light  faded  from  the  ruined  floor.  The  glorious  afternoon  was 
drawing  in.  The  men  did  not  speak.  And  then  in  the  lengthening 
silence,  there  floated  up  small  noises:  a  door  creaking  open;  quiet 
feet  upon  the  stairs;  a  faint  swishing  as  of  a  skirt. 

The  parson  was  standing  by  the  half-open  door. 

"D'you  think,  sir,"  he  spoke  suddenly  aloud,  "there's  any 
way  to  preach  to  a  man,  like  just  being  better  than  he  is?" 

O'Neill  roused,  but  made  no  answer.  He  had  been  thinking  of 
the  day  he  had  seen  this  fellow  Garland  dodging  down  the  hall 

499 


V.  .V.'s     Eyes 


with  those  trousers  there.  Then,  becoming  aware  of  the  foot 
steps,  he  said: 

"Pond  back...  Is  it?" 

But  Mr.  Dayne,  looking  out  down  the  corridor,  said  no.  After 
a  pause,  he  added,  in  a  yet  lower  voice: 

"It's  young  Cooney,  from  the  Works  .  .  .  And  a  lady." 

A  change  had  gone  over  the  parson's  kind  face,  making  it  still 
kinder.  His  sense  of  surrounding  desolation  ebbed  from  him. 
People  acknowledged  their  heavy  debt;  paid  as  stoutly  as  they 
could.  On  the  stairs  there  he  saw,  coming,  the  daughter  of  the 
man  whose  negligence  had  taken  to-day  a  young  life  not  easily  to 
be  spared. 

"They're  both  friends  of  mine,"  added  Mr.  Dayne,  gently, 
"Perhaps  you  will  excuse  me  a  moment?" 

And  he  stepped  out  into  the  hall,  shutting  the  door  quietly 
behind  him. 

So  Mr.  Dayne  thought.  But  under  the  heavy  veil  she  wore, 
this  was  less  a  daughter  than  a  woman:  Cally,  who  had  loved  for 
a  day  and  in  the  evening  heard  that  her  love  was  dead. 

The  thought  behind  the  venture  had  been  Chas's.  Nothing 
required  him  at  the  House  of  Heth;  he  was  for  getting  his  sister 
and  going  to  see  what  help  the  Dabney  House  might  need.  And 
at  the  last  minute,  she  had  put  on  her  hat  again,  and  gone  too. 
Nothing  that  Mr.  Dayne  had  felt  about  the  loneliness  of  this  end 
could  touch  what  Cally  had  felt.  Of  whom,  too,  was  help  more 
required  than  of  her,  now  or  never  any  more?  So  they  had 
driven  three  from  Saltman's  to  the  old  hotel,  where  she  had 
thought  to  come  to  a  meeting  to-day.  And  then  Henrietta,  who 
had  come  out  from  her  typewriter  strong  and  white  as  ice, 
methodically  sticking  in  hatpins  as  she  crossed  the  sidewalk; 
Hen,  the  iron-hearted,  had  quite  suddenly  broken  down;  laying 
her  cold  face  in  Cally's  lap,  weeping  wildly  that  she  would  not 
bear  it. ... 

So  Cally  must  brave  the  stairs  without  her,  must  speak  to  who 
might  be  here.  But  she  did  not  mind.  Strength  had  come  to  her 
with  the  consciousness  that  had  returned  all  too  quickly:  the 

500 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

dead  strength  of  the  inanimate.  She  was  dark  and  cold  within 
as  the  spaces  between  the  worlds.  .  .  . 

And  now  the  two  cousins  met  Mr.  Dayne  in  this  strange  end 
less  corridor;  and  knew  that  no  services  were  asked  of  them. 

They  greeted  with  little  speech.  Mr.  Dayne  told  of  the  simple 
dispositions  they  were  making.  Chas  explained  how  Mr.  Heth 
had  tried  to  communicate  with  Mrs.  Mason,  —  whom  Mr. 
Dayne  had  quite  overlooked,  it  seemed,  —  but  found  that  she 
was  out  of  town;  had  telegraphed;  how  he  would  have  come 
down  with  them  now,  but  had  had  to  stop  for  the  setting  of  his 
arm.  Uncle  Thornton  would  come  this  evening.  .  .  . 

"Ah,  that's  kind  of  him,"  said  Mr.  Dayne.  "He  must  be  in 
much  pain.  .  .  ." 

Then  silence  fell.  There  seemed  nothing  to  say  or  do.  How 
think  that  she  could  serve  —  mitigate  these  numb  horrors  of 
pain  and  self-reproach?  All  was  over. 

"Where  is  he?"  said  Cally,  her  voice  so  little  and  calm. 

The  clergyman  told  her.  And  then  all  three  stood  looking 
down  the  corridor  to  the  door  at  the  end  of  it :  a  shut  door  marked 
in  white  letters:  DR.  VIVIAN.  .  .  .  But  nothing  could  hurt  her 
now. 

"We  thought  that  was  right,"  said  Mr.  Dayne "Will  you 

go  in  for  a  moment?" 

Briefly  the  girl's  veiled  eyes  met  his.  He  was  aware  that  a  little 
tremor  went  through  her;  perhaps  he  then  understood  a  little 
further.  And  he  thought  he  had  never  seen  anybody  so  beautiful 
and  white. 

He  added  in  his  comforting  way:  "There's  no  one  at  all  with 
him  except  the  little  girl  here,  Corinne,  that  he  was  kind  to.  .  .  ." 

Surely  there  was  never  a  loneliness  like  this  loneliness. 

"I  will  go,  if  I  may,"  said  Cally. 

Chas  was  eyeing  her,  unbelievably  grave,  turning  his  hat 
between  his  hands.  And  then  she  remembered  Hen,  left  alone, 
who  would  not  be  comforted. 

She  whispered:  "Don't  wait  for  me.  ...  I'll  come  in  a 
minute." 

The  young  man  hesitated;  they  spoke  a  moment;  it  was  so 


V.    V. 


Eyes 


arranged.  Chas  was  tipping  away  from  her  down  the  well  of  the 
stairs. 

And  she  and  the  clergyman  were  walking  up  the  corridor,  his 
hand  at  her  elbow,  to  the  door  with  the  white  letters  on  it. 

As  Mr.  Dayne's  hand  touched  the  knob,  she  spoke  again,  very 
low. 

"Is  he...  Is  he  — much...?" 

"No,"  said  Mr.  Dayne,  "the  injuries  were  internal.  There's 
hardly  a  mark.  .  .  ." 

So,  opening  the  door  softly,  he  left. her. 

And  she  was  within,  the  door  a  step  or  two  behind  her,  in  front 
a  long  space,  drawn  blinds,  and  the  indistinguishable  twilight. 
Somewhere  before  her  was  the  mortal  man  who  had  pledged 
her  one  day  that  he  would  prove  his  friendship  with  his  life. 

And  how  came  she  here;  by  what  right? 

She  had  perceived  remotely  that  she  was  not  alone.  Out  of  the 
dim  great  stretches  there  emerged  advancing  a  little  figure,  black- 
clad;  advancing  silent,  with  lowered  head.  Drawing  near,  she 
did  not  look  up,  did  not  speak:  she  was  merely  fading  from  the 
room. 

The  figure  was  vaguely  apprehended,  as  one  upon  another 
planet.  But  Cally,  stirring  slightly  as  she  slipped  past,  made  a 
movement  with  her  hand  and  said,  just  audibly: 

"Don't  go." 

The  girl  must  have  paused.  There  came  a  tiny  voice: 

"Yes,  ma'am.  I'll  ...  just  step  out."  And  then,  yet  fainter: 
"I  was  wishin'  you'd  come,  ma'am." 

It  was  the  stillness  of  the  world's  last  Sabbath.  Gathering 
dusk  was  here,  and  mortal  fear.  Her  limbs  ran  to  marble. 
There  came  again  the  lifeless  whisper. 

"Don't  be  afraid,  ma'am.  ...  He  looks  so  beautiful." 

The  understanding  speech,  the  voice,  seemed  to  penetrate  her 
consciousness.  Her  eyes  drew  out  of  the  dusk,  turned  upon  the 
small  figure  at  her  side:  the  little  girl  he  had  been  fond  of,  her 
father's  three  years'  buncher.  And  then  she  heard  herself 
breathing  suddenly,  faintly: 

"Ah!  .  .  .  You  poor,  poor  child!  .  .  ." 

502 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

And  her  heart,  which  had  been  quite  dead,  was  suddenly 
alive  and  twisting  within  her.  .  .  . 

She  had  been  engulfed  in  her  own  abyss.  Tragedy  was  on  every 
side,  horrors  pouring  in,  swamping  her  being.  Feeling  had 
drowned  in  the  icy  void.  Not  Hen's  tears  had  touched  her,  not 
her  father's  stricken  grief.  But  when  her  eyes  came  upon  this 
small  face,  something  written  there  pierced  her  through  and 
through.  Such  a  shocking  little  face  it  was,  so  pinched  with  no 
hope  of  tears.  .  .  . 

In  the  darkness  of  the  shuttered  office,  two  stood  near  who  were 
worlds  apart.  And,  for  the  first  time  since  she  had  looked  down 
from  her  window  at  home,  Cally  was  lifted  out  of  herself.  .  .  . 

"I  —  you  must  let  me  see  you  —  in  a  day  or  two,  won't  you? " 
she  said  hurriedly,  below  her  breath.  "I  should  like  so  much  .  .  . 
to  help  you,  if  I  could.  ..." 

A  quiver  went  over  the  little  mask;  but  the  girl  spoke  in  the 
same  stony  way: 

"Oh,  ma'am  ...  it's  so  kind  ...  I'll  go  now." 

But  the  hollowness  of  Cally's  speech  had  mocked  the  sudden 
sympathy  upwelling  within  her.  Her  arm  was  upon  the  work- 
girl's  frail  shoulder;  her  indistinct  voice  suddenly  tremulous. 

"  Don't  think  I  imagine  that  any  one  can  ever  replace  .  .  .  You 
must  know  I  understand  .  .  .  what  your  loss  is." 

Kern  shrunk  against  the  wall  by  the  door.  No  moment  this,  to 
speak  of  what  had  so  long  been  hid. 

"He  was  like  a  father  to  me,  ma'am,  an'  more.  .  .  ." 

And  then,  as  if  to  prove  that  she  claimed  no  right  at  all  in  this 
room,  as  if  all  depended  on  her  establishing  finally  the  humble 
and  spiritual  nature  of  her  regard,  she  breathed  what  in  happier 
days  had  been  close  to  her  heart: 

"He  was  teaching  me  to  be  a  lady.  ..." 

Who  shall  say  how  marvels  befall,  and  the  dearest  dream  comes 
true?  Was  it  the  pitifulness  of  the  little  hope  laid  bare?  Or  the 
secret  shrinking  behind  that,  but  surprised  at  last?  Or  was  it  the 
knowledge  of  a  beautiful  delicacy  shown  by  this  little  girl  before 
to-day? 

Miss  Heth's  arm  was  about  her  neck,  and  her  voice,  which  was 

503 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


so  pretty  even  when  you  could  hardly  hear  it,  said,  true  as 
true: 

"I  think  you've  been  a  lady  all  along,  Co-rinne." 

And  then  the  bands  about  Kern's  heart  snapped,  and  she  could 
cry 

The  storm  came  suddenly,  like  the  bursting  of  a  dam.  A  bad 
time  certainly;  it  was  hard  to  be  torn  so,  yet  to  make  no  cry  or 
sound;  in  any  case,  distressing  to  others.  And  surely  salt  water 
could  n't  be  good  for  this  lovely  cloth,  where  her  face  lay.  .  .  . 

Yet  one  does  n't  think  overmuch  of  things  like  that,  when  the 
barriers  on  the  great  common  go  toppling  down.  And  there  was 
Sisterhood  there  all  the  time.  .  .  . 

And  above  the  stillness  and  the  racking,  Kern  heard  his  beau 
tiful  lady's  voice  once  more,  speaking  to  her  own  heart  now,  so 
low,  oh,  so  broken: 

"  Ah,  but  he  was  teaching  me.  ..." 

And  then  Kern  must  go  quickly,  lest  she  disgrace  herself  for 
ever;  screaming  aloud  as  she  had  heard  women  who  were  not 
ladies.  .  .  . 

The  girl  was  gone,  her  head  between  her  hands.  And  Cally 
Heth  stood  alone  in  the  more  than  churchly  stillness. 

She  was  breaking  up  within.  The  drowned  being  stirred  to  life, 
with  multiplying  pains.  And  yet,  in  giving  comfort,  she  had 
mysteriously  taken  it.  There  came  to  her  a  fortitude  that  was 
not  of  death. 

No  sound  penetrated  to  the  silent  waiting-room. 

The  two  men  there  spoke  little.  They  had  talked  what  they 
had  to  say.  Sam  O'Neill  looked  at  his  watch;  it  was  twenty-five 
minutes  to  six.  And,  a  moment  later,  Director  Pond  came  up  the 
steps,  entered  and  said: 

"Bloom  will  be  here  at  six  o'clock." 

They  spoke  briefly  of  this.  The  friends  of  the  neighborhood 
were  to  be  admitted;  it  was  agreed  that  this  should  be  arranged 
for  to-morrow  morning.  Pond  then  said: 

"Is  Miss  Heth  in  there?" 

Mr.  Dayne  said  that  she  was.  And  Sam  O'Neill,  who  had  not 

504 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

known  who  the  visitor  was,  first  looked  startled  and  then  lapsed 
off  into  heavy  musings.  .  .  . 

The  Director  sat  down  on  a  chair  by  the  door.  His  strong  face 
looked  tired. 

"Won't  you,  a  little  later,"  he  said  to  Mr.  Dayne,  "go  down 
and  say  a  few  words  to  the  people  outside?  They'd  appreciate 
it." 
fc  The  parson,  biting  his  crisp  mustache,  said  that  he  would. 

Pond  sat  absently  eyeing  the  pile  of  men's  clothes  beside  him; 
and  after  a  time  he  asked  what  they  were  there  for.  Mr.  Dayne 
seemed  less  and  less  disposed  for  conversation.  So  it  was  Sam 
who  told,  in  a  somewhat  halting  fashion,  of  the  coming  of  the 
crows.  .  .  . 

Pond,  whom  no  one  could  have  taken  for  a  sentimentalist, 
made  no  comment  whatever.  Presently  he  felt  Mr.  Dayne's  eye 
upon  him. 

"Well,  would  it  work  out,  do  you  think?" 

The  Director  shook  his  head  slightly,  disclaiming  authority. 
But  after  a  time  he  said: 

"Not  as  long  as  men '11  try  it  only  once  every  two  thousand 
years." 

The  parson's  eyes  dreamed  off. 

"He  believed  in  miracles.  And  so  they  were  always  happening 
to  him.  .  .  .  Oh,  it's  all  so  simple  when  you  stop  to  think." 

Then  there  was  silence  and  the  creeping  twilight.  Sam  O'Neill 
stood  picking  at  a  splotch  on  the  ancient  plaster,  with  strong, 
yellow-gloved  hands.  Mr.  Dayne  walked  about,  his  arms  crossed 
behind  him.  Upon  Pond  there  came  a  sort  of  restlessness. 

He  said  abruptly:  "How  long  has  Miss  Heth  been  here?" 

"Oh  —  a  —  little  while,"  said  the  parson,  rousing.  .  .  .  "Long 
enough,  no  doubt." 

The  dark-eyed  Director  was  standing.  The  two  men  exchanged 
a  look;  they  seemed  to  feel  each  other.  Here  was  a  matter  with 
which  the  Labor  Commissioner  had  nothing  to  do. 

"Well,  then,"  said  Pond,  with  a  little  intake  of  breath,  "I'll 
go  in." 

The  Director  shut  the  door  into  the  hall,  took  his  hat  from  the 

SOS 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

chair.  He  crossed  the  bare  waiting-room,  and  turned  the  knob 
of  the  frequented  door  into  the  office. 

This  door  he  opened,  gently,  just  far  enough  to  let  himself  in; 
he  closed  it  at  once  behind  him.  Nevertheless,  by  the  chance  of 
their  position,  the  other  two  saw,  through  the  darkness  of  the 
room  beyond,  what  was  not  meant  for  their  eyes. 

A  simple  scene,  in  all  truth;  none  commoner  in  the  world;  it 
really  did  not  matter  who  saw.  Yet  the  two  men  in  the  waiting- 
room,  beholding,  turned  away,  and  Sam  O'Neill  bit  a  groan 
through  in  the  middle. 

He  had  never  understood  his  friend,  but  he  had  loved  him  in 
his  way.  Old  memories  twitched;  his  poise  wavered.  He  lacked 
the  parson's  inner  supports.  He  paced  about  for  some  time,  mak 
ing  little  noises  in  his  throat.  And  then  he  tried  his  voice  on  a 
question. 

"Did  you  ever  hear  him  speak  of  John  the  Baptist?" 

Mr.  Dayne  halted,  and  looked. 

And  Sam  O'Neill,  with  some  difficulty  and  in  his  own  way,  told 
of  V.  V.'s  creed  about  the  Huns.  Of  how  he  had  maintained  that 
they  needed  awakening,  nothing  else,  and  were  always  ready  and 
waiting  for  it,  no  matter  how  little  they  themselves  knew  that. 
And,  finally,  how  he  had  said  one  day  —  in  a  phrase  that  had 
been  brought  flashing  back  over  the  months  —  that  if  a  man 
but  called  to  such  as  these  in  the  right  voice,  he  could  not  hide 
himself  where  they  would  not  come  to  him  on  their  knees.  .  .  . 

Mr.  Dayne  had  stood  listening  with  a  half-mystical  look,  a  man 
groping  for  elusive  truths.  Now  his  fine  composure  seemed  to 
cloud  for  a  moment;  but  it  shone  out  again,  fair  and  strong.  And 
presently,  as  he  paced,  he  was  heard  humming  again  his  strange 
paradoxical  song,  which  he,  a  parson,  seemed  to  lean  upon,  as 
a  wounded  man  leans  on  his  friend. 

Her  spirit  returned  to  her  body  from  the  far  countries,  not 
without  some  pain  of  juncture.  But  there  was  no  strangeness 
now  in  being  in  this  room;  none  in  finding  Mr.  Pond  at  her  side, 
his  saddened  gaze  upon  her.  Happen  what  might,  nothing  any 
more  would  ever  seem  strange.  .  .  . 

506 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


"Won't  you  come  with  me  now?" 

She  stood,  whispering:  "Come  with  you?" 

And  Pond's  strong  heart  turned  a  little  when  he  saw  her 
eyes,  so  circled,  so  dark  with  tears  that  were  to  come. 

"Your  cousins  are  waiting,  are  n't  they?  .  .  .  And  don't  you 
think  your  father  might  need  you?" 

A  little  spasm  distorted  the  lovely  face,  unveiled  now. 

She  inclined  her  head.  Pond  walked  away  toward  the  door; 
stood  there  silently,  drawing  a  finger  over  faded  panels.  Behind 
him  was  the  absence  of  all  sound:  the  wordlessness  of  partings 
that  were  final  for  this  world.  .  .  . 

She  had  seen  in  his  great  dignity  the  man  who  had  given  to 
the  House  of  Heth  the  last  full  measure  of  his  confidence.  And 
it  was  as  his  little  friend  had  said.  He  was  beautiful  with  the  best 
of  all  his  looks;  the  look  he  had  worn  yesterday  in  the  library,  as 
he  went  to  meet  her  poor  father. 

They  had  slain  him,  and  yet  he  trusted. 

No  design  of  hers  had  led  her  alone  beside  this  resting-place: 
that  was  chance,  or  it  was  God.  But  now  it  seemed  that  other 
wise  it  would  henceforward  not  have  been  bearable.  For  with 
this  first  near  touch  of  death,  there  had  come,  strangely  hand  in 
hand,  her  first  vision  of  the  Eternal.  The  look  of  this  spirit  was 
not  toward  time,  and  over  the  body  of  this  death  there  had  de 
scended  the  robe  of  a  more  abundant  Life. 

So  she  turned  quickly  and  came  away.  .  .  . 

She  was  outside  now.  The  door  was  shut  behind.  And  she  was 
walking  with  Mr.  Pond  down  the  corridor,  which  was  so  long, 
echoing  so  emptily.  She  became  aware  that  her  knees  were  trem 
bling.  And  Corinne's  fear  now  was  hers. 

She  desired  to  be  at  once  where  no  one  could  see  her.  But  at 
the  head  of  the  grand  stairway,  in  the  desolating  loneliness,  Mr. 
Pond  stopped  walking.  And  then  he  held  a  hand  of  hers  between 
two  of  his;  pressed  it  hard,  released  it. 

He  was  speaking  in  a  voice  that  seemed  vaguely  unlike  his 
own. 

"It's  hard  for  you  —  for  your  father  —  for  all  of  us  down 
here.  His  life  was  needed  .  .  .  wonderfully,  for  such  a  boy.  And 

507 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 


yet .  .  .  How  could  a  man  wish  it  better  with  himself?  He 
would  n't,  that  I  'm  sure  of. ...  Gave  away  his  life  every  day,  and 
at  the  end  flung  it  all  out  at  once,  to  save  a  factory  negro.  Don't 
you  know  that  if  he'd  lived  a  thousand  years,  he  could  never 
have  put  one  touch  to  that?" 

Cally  said  unsteadily:  "I  know  that's  true.  ..." 

She  wished  to  go  on;  but  the  Director  was  speaking  again, 
hurriedly: 

"And  you  must  n't  think  that  a  blow  on  the  head  can  bring  it 
all  to  an  end.  If  I  know  anything,  his  story  will  be  often  told. 
People'  that  you  and  I  will  never  know,  will  know  of  this,  and  it 
will  help  them  —  when  their  pinch  comes.  There 's  no  measuring 
the  value  of  a  great  example.  When  it  strikes,  you  can  feel  the 
whole  line  lift " 

And  then  he  added,  in  a  let-down  sort  of  way:  "Freest  man  I 
ever  saw." 

There  was  no  reply  to  make  to  these  things.  They  went  down 
the  stairs  together.  Halfway  down,  the  man  spoke  again: 

"In  the  little  while  I've  been  here,  I've  seen  and  heard  a  great 
deal.  Some  day  you  must  let  me  tell  you  —  how  much  there  is 
down  here  to  keep  his  memory  green." 

The  stairs  were  long.  A  kind  of  terror  was  growing  within  her. 
She  would  go  to  pieces  before  she  reached  the  bottom.  But  that 
peril  passed;  and  very  near  now  was  the  waiting  car,  and  merciful 
shelter.  .  .  . 

They  crossed,  amid  springing  memories,  the  old  court  where, 
one  rainy  afternoon,  there  had  happened  what  had  turned  her  life 
thenceforward.  Then  they  were  safely  through  the  door,  and  came 
out  upon  the  portico,  into  the  last  light  of  the  dying  afternoon. 
And  here,  above  all  else  that  she  felt,  she  encountered  a  dim 
surprise. 

When  she  had  passed  this  way  a  little  while  before,  it  was  as  if 
all  power  of  feeling  had  been  frozen  in  her.  Sights  and  sounds 
were  not  for  her.  So  now  the  sudden  spectacle  that  met  her  eyes 
came  as  a  large  vague  confusion. 

The  shabby  street  was  black  with  people. 

Her  affliction  had  been  so  supremely  personal,  her  sense  of  this 


V.    V.'s     Eyes 

man's  tragic  solitariness  in  the  world  so  overwhelming,  that  she 
could  not  at  once  take  in  the  meaning  of  what  she  saw.  She 
must  have  faltered  to  a  pause.  And  she  heard  Pond's  voice,  so 
strangely  gentle: 

"You  see  he  was  much  loved  here." 

Her  eyes  went  once  over  the  dingy  street,  the  memorable  scene. 
Thought  shook  through  her  in  poignant  pictures.  .  .  .  Herself,  one 
day,  prostrated  by  calamity  on  calamity;  and  in  the  little  island- 
circle  where  she  had  spent  her  life,  not  one  heart  that  had  taken 
her  sorrow  as  its  own.  And  beside  that  picture,  this:  a  great  com 
pany,  men  and  women,  old  and  young,  silent  beneath  a  window: 
and  somewhere  among  them  the  sounds  of  persistent  weeping 

And  Cally  seemed  suddenly  to  see  what  had  been  hidden  from 
her  before.  If  he  was  much  loved,  it  was  because  he  had  loved 
much. 

Yet  her  confusion  must  have  lingered.  Was  it  so,  indeed? 
Many,  so  many,  to  compensate  his  loneliness?  It  seemed  to  be 
important  to  understand  clearly;  and  she  turned  her  veiled  face 
toward  Pond,  and  spoke  indistinctly: 

"All  these  ...  Are  they  all  ...  his  friends?" 

There  sprang  a  light  into  the  Director's  hawk-eyes,  changing 
his  whole  look  wonderfully. 

"They're  his  mother,"  he  said,  "and  his  brothers  and  his 
sisters.  ..." 


THE   END 


(STfce 

CAMBRIDGE  .  MASSACHUSETTS 
U   .   S   .  A 


V.  V.'S  EYES 


By  HENRY  SYDNOR  HARRISON 

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ion  and  the  boundless  faith  in  humanity  that  are  typi 
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cord-Herald. 

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son  definitely  takes  his  place  as  the  one  among  our 
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yet  unhurried  enjoyment."  —  Life. 

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N_?__890560 


PS3515  Harrison,  Henry  Sydnor,  1880-1930. 

?l?83  V.  V/s  eyes,  by  Henry  Syclnor  Harrison  ...     Boston 

\J2  New  York,  Houghton  Mifflin  company,  1913. 

x  p.,  2  1.,  508,  (2|  p.    front,,  plates.    10 1*. 


i.  TiUe. 

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